


On the Hour, Every Hour

by Silver_Shortage_in_Markarth



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: A really rotten and moldy slice that is, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Bertholdt does weird shit, Crossdressing Levi, Gen, Jean gets smacked around a lot, Lots and lots of Vomiting, Mentions of Cancer, One chapter has vomiting, Poor attempts at various kinds of humor, Slice of Life, Stupidity, a lot of stupidity, also there's an alligator, because me not good at visual, costume porn, general stupidity
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-29
Updated: 2019-04-04
Packaged: 2019-05-26 02:11:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 16
Words: 24,147
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14990510
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Silver_Shortage_in_Markarth/pseuds/Silver_Shortage_in_Markarth
Summary: A story about sad, pathetic people living sad, pathetic lives.





	1. Meet the Cast

**Author's Note:**

> I don't even know what the hell this is or what it's going to turn into
> 
> Probably won't even be that funny because I'm awful at comedy

Today officially marked Eren's moving process complete. As he readjusted the frame containing his broadcasting degree, he couldn't help but wear a wide grin upon his face. 

Finally, after all the money and time spent, he'd graduated. He hadn't quite gotten cum laude (he forgot who had this year), but he'd done well enough. Now, he was moved into his own apartment, and ready to start his life independently. 

The first thing Eren noticed, as in  _really_  noticed, after dealing with having everything in its place, was just how quiet it was now. It was surprising how much of a contrast there was between now and when he lived with the others. For the first time since he'd started college, he could actually hear himself think. 

Not that that would matter in a few moments, anyway. 

A little while after Eren started to look out the window, towards the place he'd start his new job, the phone rang. The shrill, piercing noise just about felt like a knife to his eardrums (his adopted sister Mikasa had gotten that new phone for him as a moving in gift. He'd thought the thing was gaudy and hideous, but he didn't dare tell her that).

He still had his finger in one of his ears when he picked up and answered. 

"Hello?"

...

"Eren!" Marco's cheery voice could be heard on the other end, somehow being heard over the television. "Hi! I'm not interrupting anything important, am I?" 

Marco tried to get himself comfortable on his couch, making certain he didn't twist any of the IV tubing he was currently attached to. Outside his room, he could hear the living room TV on the Spanish language channel, the volume blaring just a little too much. 

"Oh, hang on," Marco said to Eren before the latter could actually say anything.

"Bert!" He called out while holding his hand over the receiver. "Bert, turn the TV down! I'm trying to talk to Eren!"

There was no response, and the TV did not get turned down. Marco could only sigh and covered his other ear. 

"Sorry, Eren," he said now. "I think Bertholdt's having another one of his 'episodes' already."

"Isn't it kind of early for him to be doing that?" 

"It is," Marco answered sadly. "Anyway, how's it been since you moved out?" 

...

The conversation that ensued involved mostly trivial pleasantries, along with congratulations on Eren getting a job at the TV station in town. Granted, it wasn't too glamorous: it mostly involved bringing reporters and scriptwriters their coffee and lunches, and getting the right shows ready to air during weeknights. 

Still, it was something worth celebrating, at least to Marco anyway. Anything if it meant someone in their sad little group of roommates ended up actually making something of his life. 

Hopefully he'd still help them out in the future if things like their rent couldn't get paid on time. 

"I...I have to go now, Eren." As much as he didn't want to, Marco had to go to a doctor's appointment to see how his treatments were progressing. 

"Huh? Oh, okay. Talk to you soon!" 

Eren then hung up a little too quickly, leaving Marco unable to actually say a proper goodbye. He simply closed his mouth, and then listened to the dial tone for a little bit before hanging up himself. 

He then just stared at his feet for a little bit before standing up, making sure he didn't get caught in any of his tubing as he slipped on a pair of oversized sandals (he didn't really remember who they belonged to; none of the roommates really organized their closets after laundry was done). 

Marco then got to his feet and went into the living room, where the rapid fire Spanish of some game show coming from the TV was hitting his ears in full force. 

...

"Bert, I'm going to my appointment now," Marco said to Bertholdt in a loud voice. "Make sure you keep the door unlocked so the others can get in." 

He paused halfway to the door. "But don't leave it open for any reason. Remember, we're trying to keep that alligator  _out_ of our apartment."

The whole time until Marco left, Bertholdt had not acknowledged him; the colors of the game show he was watching were just that enchanting to him. He did manage to find the remote and change it to some kind of talk show, eventually. 

...

It was awkward having to walk down the filthy and smelly hallway, no matter how many times he'd done it before. Marco tried to cover his nose and mouth with his shirt while he meandered toward the exit of the apartment building. As he did, he passed a few of the other tenants. None of them looked up or said hi to him.

And really, he didn't expect them to; they all had their own problems to deal with besides worrying about their neighbor dealing with cancer.

In all honesty, Marco didn't know whether to count himself lucky or not. As he got outside, got into his truck and turned the key, he started thinking over his current lot in life.

Never in his life did Marco expect to be dealing with such a life-threatening condition. He also didn't expect the overwhelming support from his roommates.

Eren had been the first one he told, mainly because he had been the only other person in the apartment at the time. He seemed to have taken the news fairly well, or at least as much as someone could take news like that. At the very least, he helped when it came time to break the news to the others.

Turning right at the first stop sign, Marco was then reminded of who else was at the hospital. He then pinched the bridge of his nose, knowing one of them would have to ride home in the back.

Marco figured he could deal with that later, though, when he finished with his appointment.

...

"I'm leaving now!" Sasha told Connie while she slung her bag over her shoulder.

Connie was momentarily distracted by this, and turned to look at her.

"Hm? Oh yeah, you're off early today, ain't you?"

Sasha nodded. "I'll stop by the apartment later to bring you guys dinner, though!"

She then waved goodbye to Connie, who reciprocated along with a request to drive safely.

And with that, Sasha left the little cafe both she and Connie worked at. Once she was out the door, he went back to watching TV. He figured he was allowed to, since there weren't many people in the place and he wasn't cooking right now.

He just wished the TV got more channels; evidently the cafe was located in some kind of dead zone, or so the owner claimed (chances were the owner was just being a cheapskate).

It was better than nothing, at least. He also chalked it up to it being in not the best part of town.

Waiting for any more customers to show up, Connie was occupied by The Petra Ral show, some kind of talk show that took place in their town. It was alright, if a tad glurge-y. Better than most Trash TV shows that still aired nowadays, anyway.

Connie kept his vision glued to the screen when he felt his phone buzz to indicate a text message. Checking it revealed it to be from Reiner.

_Have you heard anything from the others yet?_

As quick as he could, Connie answered simply and briefly:

_No, not yet._

...

It was anybody's guess as to how Reiner was able to bench press with one hand, and text with the other. Whatever the reason was, he was certainly able to focus on one thing, while not having to neglect the other thing. Reiner was also somehow able to tune out most of the chatter of some nearby treadmill users, who were clearly talking about him; he caught the occasional remark about his 'cute butt', but really, he didn't care about that.

What he did care about was having to deal with any messes that Bertholdt might have caused while he was away. It was usually his responsibility to take care of him, after all. As he was nearing his last few planned bench presses, Reiner felt his phone vibrate on his chest, indicating that Connie had probably responded. Getting one hand free, he reached down to grab hold of it.

However, as he did so, Reiner didn't notice that his hold on his current barbell wasn't exactly a perfect balance. Just as he grabbed hold of his phone, he felt his grip on the barbell suddenly loosen with no explanation.

In the end, it resulted in him flying off the bench he was laying on, and flopping to the ground. To add insult to injury, he felt and heard his shorts rip.

He tried to play it cool and checked his messages anyway, all while still on his back.

...

"Well, Mister Bott," Doctor Hange said while looking over the paperwork detailing his current medical situation, "I will say that from what I've seen, your condition seems to be...improving."

Her last word caused a swell of joy and relief when Marco heard it. Any good news was welcomed at this point.

"I won't say you've entered a complete remission, just...If you wish, I'd say you could take a break from treatment."

Hange's creepily cheery expression faltered just a bit. "Keep in mind, though; if your cancer starts up again, back on chemo you go."

As Marco was leaving to return to the waiting room, he laid a hand on the top of his head, feeling it through his teddy-bear printed bandana. He couldn't help but grin; there was a chance he could grow his hair back, to the once impressively pitch-black locks he'd had before his diagnosis.

He was then snapped out of his thoughts by the sound of two of his other roommates behind him.

...

"How many injections did that doctor give you again?"

Armin was just a little concerned about Jean right now, considering what he just put himself through a few minutes ago. He never really was that supportive of his unorthodox methods of making money. This time wasn't really an exception.

Jean simply waved him off. "Relax, Armin. I'm cool to drive. I can't see a whole lot in front of me right now, but I can still drive."

"That is not what I asked, Jean," Armin said while Jean pressed one of his palms flat onto his face, and squeezed gently. Marco watched all this, and couldn't help but snicker just a little.

"I think you may want to leave the driving aspect of all this to me for now, Jean," he said to him. "At least until you know what the effects of this round of injections are."

Armin could only look at him through Jean's spread fingers, and nodded as best he could.

...

Roughly a minute later, the three of them were walking out to the truck. The whole time, Jean kept staring straight ahead, not letting go of either of them.

"I really wish he'd find a safer and more consistent form of income," Armin whispered to Marco while keeping Jean from wandering away into traffic or something like that. Marco could only really shrug.

"I'm not condoning it myself," he said, "but given our financial situation, we take what we can get-" He was interrupted by Jean suddenly beginning to shriek bloody murder for no apparent reason, while pointing at nothing.

"Jean?" Armin inquired in a loud enough voice. "Jean, what is it?!" To answer his question, Jean looked over at Armin, and pointed at him instead, screaming the whole time. The other two then watched awkwardly as he turned and ran in the other direction.

Right into a lamppost.

"You want me to grab his legs?" Armin asked.

"Please do."

Both of them then were carrying Jean to the back of the truck, throwing him into it in an almost unceremonious manner, before getting in themselves and driving home.

...

Holding a bag of takeout, Mikasa dialed Eren's new phone number one-handed, while she managed to push open the door out of her house with her shoulder. New apartment or not, she had to make sure he wasn't skipping meals.

She pointedly ignored the texts from the others, interestingly enough. Right now, Eren was her top priority. It wasn't too far a walk there, thus making her decide to do that. It looked to be a good decision; the traffic was awful. As she walked, Mikasa could hear the blaring of horns being honked, and expletives shouted by the drivers.

The other reason for her impending arrival was to celebrate him getting a new job; that was always a good thing.

"Hello-" Eren was cut off by Mikasa giving her usual greeting when the call connected.

"I'm coming to your apartment right now." She didn't give him much of a word in edgewise the rest of the way, until she reached his apartment.

...

That evening, when everyone else got home, Armin was the unlucky one chosen to drop off the rent. He'd been the one who drew the short straw, after all. That, and their usual scapegoat in regards for paying their rent (which was Jean) had yet to awaken from his earlier antics.

"Hello?" He called out when he knocked on the door to the landlord's office across the hall. "Mister Smith? Are you in? Hello!"

No answer. The frosted glass window on the door was dark, indicating Mister Smith probably wasn't actually in. Sighing in frustration, Armin tried jiggling the doorknob, which surprisingly led the door to open. It creaked on its hinges as he entered, trying to find the light switch so he could locate the desk. When he did though, he wished he hadn't.

Once the buzzing fluorescent lights flickered on, Armin was confronted with Mister Smith passed out on the floor in his underwear. Straddling his waist was his assistant, who looked to be drawing a number of profane words and images all over his body. Indeed, he was drawing a grotesquely detailed penis on his forehead before looking up at who interrupted him.

"Um..." Armin was disturbed enough as it were. "Just dropping off our payment, Mister Levi." Oddly enough, he wasn't at all disturbed at Levi's bizarre crossdressing tendencies; he was quite used to them (but then, everyone in the apartment complex was). Even so, Armin was still kind of uncomfortable having a man in a tutu and ballet shoes glaring at him as he put the money on the desk.

All he did after that was moonwalk back out, leaving Levi to continue drawing on the landlord's face.

...

Sasha was already at the guys' apartment, holding a very big tote bag full of edibles for everybody. She was a little confused at why Jean was draped over the top of the couch. Marco, on the other hand, was more concerned about something else.

"Bertholdt, have you moved from there at all since I left?"As if to spite Marco, Bertholdt turned his head in a slow, almost mechanical fashion. After blinking twice, he turned it back and continued watching television.

In the bathroom, a loud yelp was suddenly heard. Said yelp was followed by the door creaking open, and the appearance of a large, scaly, and unwanted visitor.

"The damn thing got in **again**!" Reiner (who right now was naked and dripping wet from an interrupted shower) shouted as he leaned out from the bathroom doorway and gestured to the alligator slowly making its way to the sliding patio door.

Having gotten back from the landlord's office by now, Armin walked over and, shockingly enough, picked the alligator up, and began carrying it outside himself. This was quite a feat, considering the thing was longer than Armin was tall, and probably much heavier. Once they were outside, everyone still conscious could see and hear Armin shooing the alligator back into a nearby sewer.

This entire time, Connie was standing in front of the stove watching everybody. He suppressed a few chuckles before turning back to the hamburger he was breaking up and frying.

"How have you been able to deal with all this for so long again?" Sasha asked her boyfriend as she handed him a packet of taco seasoning. "I'd have lost my mind by now."

Connie watched everything unfold along with her, and shrugged a little.

"I dunno," he answered, "but to be honest, I wouldn't trade it for the world."

...

Eren was just about to get one of his new dinner plates out when he heard loud banging against the door. He'd barely turned the handle before Mikasa barged in and made herself at home.

"Um...welcome?"

Mikasa turned to acknowledge Eren's greeting with a smile, before getting back to the plastic bag of food she'd brought with her.

"The restaurant that the girls and I usually go to was under renovation," she told him while pulling out several containers. Eren could really smell the sesame chicken, causing his mouth to water.

It didn't take too long until Mikasa had everything in place. When she did, she tapped the area of the chair opposite her, urging Eren to take a seat.

It was a relief to not have to fight the others for a good spot at the table anymore. Not having to talk over their voices (and Jean chewing with his mouth open to be spiteful) was a relief too. All he had to listen now was how Mikasa's day went.

He could get used to this.

...

After Mikasa left that night, Eren figured it was time for bed. It didn't matter that it was only eight-thirty; he wanted to get up on time for his first day tomorrow. As he was changing into his pajamas, he looked outside towards the TV station, and smiled.

He'd heard a lot of things about the place, both positive and negative. Some said working there had been great, and a lot could be learned there; others told him it was a complete nightmare, and they treated the newbies horribly. The only way Eren would know for sure, of course, was to experience it all first-hand. In but a few short hours, he'd begin doing as such.

Once he was done slipping on his nightwear, Eren trotted off to what would be his bed until he could get some decent framework (just a mattress for now, with a few blankets thrown all across it). On his way, he closed all the curtains in his new apartment and turned the lights off. While he did, he prepared himself to hear protests that made him turn the lights back on, before remembering where he lived now.

It was also nice not to have to share a bedroom with five other guys (Marco probably didn't realize how lucky he was to have his own room, morbid as it sounded). All of the snoring, farting, sleeptalking. and occasional bedwetting (the last one was usually Reiner's fault, oddly enough) were but a distant memory to him now. Not having Jean kicking him in the face was an upside, too.

Curling up into his nice warm bed, with all of his blankets, Eren drifted off to sleep.

...

Marco couldn't sleep.

All he really could do was lay in his bed, looking out at the crescent moon in the otherwise empty night sky. A glance over to his alarm clock indicated it was around two-thirty. Sighing to himself, he got to his feet and padded out to the main room of the apartment.

It was quiet now, a stark contrast from earlier; it were almost as if he'd only imagined the boisterous socialization that had come from dinnertime. He sure wasn't imagining the nasty carpet under his feet, though. Still, Marco tolerated it until he reached the other bedroom to check on the others.

He hadn't realized he didn't tell everyone the good news earlier; he blamed that on residual chemo brain (and Jean being an interrupting douche, once he'd woken up and began screaming like some horny banshee).

Of course, he couldn't do it now; everyone was snoozing away on whatever they each individually chose to sleep on (except Bertholdt; he just passed out on the floor wherever and someone else threw a blanket over him). Along with that, there was the light snoring and the soft whirring of a CPAP machine (Connie had sleep apnea something terrible, even if he didn't look or act like he did).

Figuring everyone was okay, Marco stepped back and wandered over to the dining table and sat down. Then, he proceeded to try and think of however (and whenever) the best way to break the news would be.

...

The next day, Eren was bright and early to the TV station. There wasn't any kind of welcome ceremony or anything grandiose, but he didn't expect there to be. He did see one of the reporters walking by, one that he recognized from the weekday editions of the news.

"Hi!" He said to her with a weirdly cheerful smile, and a chuckle. "I guess I'm gonna be your new co-worker!" She said nothing. All she really did was sip at the coffee cup she was drinking out of, and walk away with a scoff. Suddenly Eren wasn't feeling so excited about this new job.

"Oh, don't mind Annie!" A voice came from behind him. "She's like that towards everyone." Eren looked behind him to see a small blonde girl holding a stack of papers (probably schedules for the day's lineup of TV), grinning at him and holding out her free hand. "Sorry, where are my manners? I'm Krista."

At least there was a friendly face willing to help him. Having to be courteous, Eren took hold of her hand and shook it.

"I'm Eren! I guess I'm going to start working here today." He used his other hand to scratch the back of his head. "So is...everyone else like that Annie woman? I didn't think she acted like that off the air, but hey, guess I was wrong."

"Nah, don't worry! Just her."

The two were then walking, chatting about what Eren was to expect by working here. As she did, Eren felt a bit more at ease. Perhaps working here wasn't going to be so bad after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you're confused I just decided to smoosh all the Meet the Cast chapters into one and decided to just update them as such (don't need a metric ton of short chapters that take forever to wade through)


	2. Day the First

With drink and snack orders in hand, Eren did his best to follow the directions he was given. He was also told who got what. Simple enough. It just got a bit annoying when most of the people on the list were already on the air, or hadn't shown up to work at all that day.

Annoying, but simple enough.

As he reached the studio that was for the local news, Eren saw a familiar face from back when he lived with the others. He was about to call out to him before remembering that the news was on air. So instead, he kept quiet and watched, waiting for Annie to finish her near monotone news reporting.

"Now we go to Weather with Levi Ackerman," she finally announced. Then she looked over to another part of the newsroom. "Levi?"

Eren watched intently as his former landlord's assistant (dressed like Snow White for some reason), carrying a large rolled up piece of paper, stomped to the weather area. He then unrolled the paper, tacked it up on the weather radar (it was the week's weather report), then flipped off the cameras before stomping off again.

While the camera was off of Annie, Eren remembered why he was there, and quick snuck over and placed her requested foodstuffs in front of her. Then he left just as fast before the camera went back to her.

...

It was normal for at least a couple students to fall asleep during class, unless that student was Armin; him falling asleep at all on campus was unheard of.

There was a first time for everything, it seemed. Armin could barely keep his eyes open as the professor droned on about...something related to whatever it was he was majoring in.

It was taking a lot out of him to even stay sitting upright, let alone take notes. Said notes also suffered; although they initially were neat and legible, soon, they degenerated into barely readable chicken scratch. And then after that, it turned into nothing more than scribbles.

Next to him, Reiner wasn't faring much better; he tried to keep one eye open in an effort to avoid the burning that came with sleepiness. He did have the sense of mind to look over at Armin, and elbowed him awake.

Armin jolted awake then, rubbing the spot on his ribs that Reiner ended up hitting. Then he went back to trying to take notes.

...

It was a slow morning at the cafe. Once more, Connie was killing time watching some public access shows on another channel before Petra Ral came on.

Sasha was out sick today, leaving him all alone in the place. He promised himself that he'd go visit her later (and try not to say "I told you so", since he knew what the real problem with her was). To try and occupy himself, Connie resorted to using up some of the less popular ingredients for espresso.

He managed to finish off a batch of mint espresso (for some reason, it tasted horrendous, even though the ingredients were fresh and the machine worked perfectly fine) when the phone rang.

"M'yello." Connie then had to listen to heavy breathing on the other end, which made him extremely uncomfortable. Then he was given more to go on as to who exactly was calling him.

"Did you know..." The caller took a deep breath, before starting over. "Did you know that the penguins are smelling green right now?"

Connie just frowned before rolling his eyes. "Morning to you too, Bert." Bertholdt took so damn long to spew his nonsense, Connie just muted the TV and read the captions of whatever poorly-acted garbage was on right now.

...

Marco and Jean could only look on as Bertholdt mumbled into their house phone. It didn't much help that Bert was also huddled in some kind of sideways fetal position while doing so.

"Which one of us do you think he's talking to?" Marco asked quietly, as he got up and tried fixing himself something to eat. Jean, on the other hand, grabbed a nearby broom and started poking Bertholdt in the ass with it. As he figured, he didn't get a whole lot of a reaction. Then he just shrugged.

"Don't know, don't care." Then he just kept watching him, so it was possible he did care just a little.

After what felt like an eternity (though it was probably only about ten minutes), Bertholdt stood up and turned the phone off. He then dropped it on the floor, and sat down on the couch to watch TV like he always did.

"He really needs a hobby," Marco said to Jean as he resorted to just grabbing some herbal tea and put the kettle on. Jean scoffed, and then leaned back on his chair while resting his hands on the back of his head.

"He does have a hobby. It's called shrooming-" Jean cut himself off when he accidentally leaned back too far, falling backwards and breaking the chair. Whilst still laying on the floor, he threw up his hands in frustration and then crossed his arms. He looked up at Marco, who was already holding a mug he was going to use.

"I'm not replacing this chair," he muttered.

...

The next person to bring edibles to was in such an empty hallway, Eren had initially thought it was a mistake. Nevertheless, he went in and peeked through all the doors to find said person.

He found him in a room full of equipment, with a camera strapped to his head. He was also strangely preoccupied with smelling the inside of another camera. Eren tried not to stare as he looked at the list to make sure he had the right guy.

"Are you..." He had to squint at the list. Whoever wrote the damn thing had handwriting worse than that of a doctor's. "Mike Zacharias?" Looking up at him, the man threw the camera he was smelling (a little too roughly) onto the floor, and stalked over to him and grabbed his coffee. Then he leaned in and sniffed Eren's face.

"Your cologne makes you smell like dead people."

Eren was a little dumbfounded at this statement. "Thank you?"

...

Once class was over and done with, Armin and Reiner went to go visit the nursing home, where Armin's senile grandfather was currently residing (whenever he didn't somehow manage to break free and get up on the roof again). As it usually was, it was awkwardly quiet and smelled weird. Besides one of the residents somewhere in the back attempting to pop a wheelie in one of the wheelchairs (probably trying to liven things up), not much was really going on.

"Thanks for coming along with me, Reiner," Armin whispered as they wandered through one of the halls. "Whenever I come alone, a lot of the old women keep pinching my cheeks. And some of them have really sharp nails." As if to emphasize this, he rubbed one of his cheeks.

"No problem," was all Reiner said in return. With no incident, the two reached Mr. Arlert's room. It was there that the incidents properly began.

Armin's grandpa was rocking a little too quickly in his rocking chair, completely naked except for a pair of knee-high socks. Next to him, a radio was playing heavy metal a bit too loudly. As it played, Mr. Arlert put his hands up in the sign of the horn. Suffice to say, his grandson was very embarrassed.

"Grandpa." He couldn't be heard over the loud music, which was giving him quite a headache. "Grandpa!" As he tried getting the old coot's attention, Reiner wandered over and unplugged the radio. As a result, the last time he called for his grandpa came out a bit too loudly.

Realizing his music stopped playing, Mr. Arlert turned his head to see his two visitors.

"Eh? Who let you in? If you don't leave, I'm calling the cops that I haven't disgusted yet." As he stood up, Reiner stepped back over to Armin and covered his eyes; the poor boy had seen his grandfather's withered old genitalia a few too many times.

...

Jean was still picking splinters out of his ass when the phone rang (Bertholdt had stopped using it when he said his nonsensical bullshit to Connie earlier). As he was still preoccupied with the task at hand, Marco went to pick it up off the floor and answer it. 

"Hello?" Marco had to stick a finger into his ear so he could hear the caller's voice better; by this time, Bertholdt decided to fill the kitchen sink up with ice water, and shove his head into it while trying to scream. "Oh hi, Mrs. Forster!" 

Right when Marco said 'Mrs. Forster', Jean's eyes grew wide; he didn't really like that his mother and her new husband were halfway around the world right now. To be more specific, he didn't like Floch in general; he thought he was some kind of loser, and his mother made a big mistake in marrying him. 

"You want to talk to Jean? Okay hang on..." When Marco covered the mouthpiece on the phone to look at Jean, he got Jean rapidly shaking his head no in response. He added onto his answer by making his arms into the shape of an X, and mouthing the word 'No' over and over. Marco gave a thumbs up and mouthed back 'Oh, okay' before returning to the phone. 

"Sorry, Mrs. Forster. I don't think he's home right now. Must be at the hospital doing those experimental shots again. But I'll let him know you called!" 

He hung up after saying goodbye, then looked over at Jean, who was trying now to get Bertholdt to stop what he was doing. 

...

Since there wasn't anybody showing up at the current hour, Connie decided to take his break. It hadn't taken him long to find the 'Be Back Soon' sign hidden under some spoiled ingredients (he really needed to get rid of those). Now seemed to be the best time to go visit Sasha. 

As he walked through town (he wished the group had more methods of transportation besides walking and Marco's truck), Connie could see that preparations for Halloween were in full effect already; all the stores had some kind of spooky or gruesome theme to their wares. It reminded him that he should probably find something to stick to the door of the apartment (provided that the landlord would let them). 

Costumes probably wouldn't hurt either. Actual costumes, not...whatever it was the guys tried to do last year; they were still finding shredded feathers around the apartment, even now. 

Candy, too. Candy was of the utmost importance, even if consuming too much of it was why Sasha didn't come into work today. At least he knew that she had a stash of the stuff hidden away somewhere in her apartment. 

Sighing to himself, Connie stopped at the railroad track and watched a train go by. He sometimes wondered precisely why he didn't move out of his current apartment, and move in with Sasha. 

He couldn't abandon the others, _that_ was why. 

...

Armin's grandpa stopped with his threats of legal action upon seeing Reiner. Then he just perked up and started patting his cheeks. 

"Oh, Armin!" He cried out. "You've gotten so big! I knew you still had a growth spurt left in you!" 

Reiner looked over at Armin and silently begged him to do something, trying not to bite at Mr. Arlert's fingers. Armin was happy to oblige. 

"Um, Grandpa?" Mr. Arlert turned his head to see an finally acknowledge Armin standing right there. 

"Are you the hooker I ordered? You weren't supposed to be here until after six!" 

Armin resisted the urge to pinch the bridge of his nose. "No, Grandpa. It's your grandson."

"My grandson's a hooker? I thought I raised him better than that! How dare you!" 

Now Armin and Reiner could only listen as Armin's grandfather went on about an ever-changing series of topics. 

**_-later that night-_ **

It didn't seem at all possible to be exhausted from just taking orders to the people working at a TV station. Eren had learned the hard way that it was indeed possible. Now dragging himself to the bathroom, he tried taking inventory from his first day. 

From the way Krista explained it, there was a possibility that Eren could get a proper job at the station, if he worked hard enough. That seemed like a long way off, though. Still, he was going to give it a try. 

Eren's mind more or less shut off after that once he stepped into the shower he had going now. He could feel the day's aches and pains melting away under the hot water. 

Tomorrow was another day. He knew what to expect now from his first day on the job. 

...

"Why are we doing this?" In an effort to save on water, everyone in the apartment (except for Marco) were standing altogether in the rather cramped space that was their shower stall. As a result, they were all squished together and very uncomfortable. 

"Because," Connie answered whoever asked the question, "we all got stuff to do tomorrow, and this is the quickest way for all of us to get clean." 

As he spoke, Armin tried desperately to get his face out of Reiner's chest, having a hard time breathing because of it. He was the unfortunate one that got stuck in the middle of everyone else, and was suffering for it. 

After that, it was quiet for a little while. Then Jean made a face that didn't quite look right, feeling something brush up against his leg.  

"Reiner, quit touching me with your nasty athlete's foot." To this, Reiner frowned, still oblivious to Armin suffocating because of him. 

"I'm not touching you. And I already got my athlete's foot treated." 

Another silence ensued, as it dawned on Jean what he just felt. Then Bertholdt stated the obvious, his voice just barely heard over the shower: 

"I think the alligator got in again somehow." 


	3. Clothing Catastrophe

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one is a lot shorter than the other two because I didn't know how else to keep it going 
> 
> Also I think the clothing descriptions in this chapter might rival that of My Immortal or My Inner Life (Translation: Ewww)

"I feel like I don't belong in here."

It'd taken a few days, or more specifically a couple of weeks, before everybody (everybody with a job, that is) got the same day off to go clothes shopping.

Whenever the others were seen in public, it was clear who had the money to splurge on decent new clothing, and who had to get stuff from second-hand stores. Armin certainly felt that way, what with a pair of way too big shorts he had on that said 'Wide Load' on the ass (he thinks they might be Reiner's). Still, he remained in the clothing store, waiting to see how Eren and Mikasa would look in their prospective outfits.

A quick glance over just confirmed that indeed, Armin didn't belong in this place. Neither did any of his roommates, not that that really mattered to any of them. They just pawed at all the merchandise like they would at any of the other stores they all went to for clothing.

"Why are we even here?" Jean moaned out of intense boredom while going through a table loaded up with men's underwear. By this time, Eren had come out of the dressing room he'd been using.

"Because my new boss Krista told me to get a more appropriate set of outfits for work. Not that you'd know how that feels." Then Eren muttered "jobless horse-faced loser" under his breath. Out of an attempt to restrain himself (by Marco's request a while back), Jean pretended he didn't hear that.

...

Right outside the store, Bertholdt was sitting on a bench, eerily calm. He kept staring off into space, his eyes opened larger than usual. Next to him, Reiner kept rubbing his shoulder to make sure he didn't go  _completely_  off his rocker.

"Okay, you got your phone tuned into that recorder app?" Nearby, Connie and Sasha were speaking quietly to themselves, in very quiet voices. "Since Bert usually tells us the weirdest shit at this time of day. We think he's doing something else alongside the shrooms, but we're not sure what. "

"Yeah, I got it up, now go talk to him and see what he tells you."

Both of them wandered over to Reiner and Bertholdt, trying not to snicker loudly. Reiner could hear them anyway, glaring at the both of them.

"So, Bert..." Connie tried to think of a good topic. "Did you know that it's going to rain pretty bad tomorrow? I don't remember if you ever watch the Weather Channel, but..." He trailed off. After a brief pause, Bertholdt said his randomly selected piece:

"Do you think rain is the Earth's way of crying over the pain and suffering that mankind has put it through? That it has become so diseased and sick that its tears of sadness are its only way of attempting to cleanse the pollution?" Another pause, then he shouted a sentence that was completely unrelated to what he already had said:

" ** _El pollo se comio mis pantalones!_** "

Bertholdt then promptly soiled himself, to the dismay and disgust of the other three.

...

To try and get used to his new purchases, Eren decided to get them checked out by ripping the tags off, and getting the cashier to scan them that way. Off to the side, Jean could be heard scoffing and snorting.

"Does this mean you're gonna start trying to become one of those rich bastards," he retorted while the others tried to get him to shut up, "and forget us at the near-bottom of society's classes?" Eren rolled his eyes as Mikasa handed him some more cash to help cover the costs.

"I'd take that more seriously if it weren't being said by the guy wearing a 'Sexy Grandma' shirt," Eren replied a bit snidely, causing Jean to blush furiously and try covering his shirt that said exactly that. Sometimes he didn't pay attention to what he pulled off the racks at Goodwill. Then he just pouted out of displeasure, again remembering not to be a dick to Eren.

Marco and Armin both smacked him in the back of the head anyway, over what he did say to him, for good measure. On the way out, Mikasa and Eren himself did the same. Needless to say, Jean was rubbing his head an awful lot by the time everyone got back home.

...

The next day at work, Eren sought out Krista as the very first thing he did before starting his shift. To his joy, he saw her in her office trying to work on a new TV schedule. Next to her, a freckled brown-haired woman sat in a chair and watched. He quickly strode over and tried to make as dramatic an entrance as he could.

He failed, mainly due to the fact that the door swung back into his face just as he was saying his prepared line. It got the attention of the other woman in the room.

"Wow, Krista! You sure know how to pick them," the woman said while opening the door and pulling him up. Krista turned away from the board, frowning.

"Oh, be nice, Ymir. He just started recently. From what I've seen and heard so far, though, he's been doing a good job..." Eren then listened to the two ladies chat about his potential in this place. At one point, all three of them started wandering through the halls of the TV station, with Krista pointing out where he'd already been.

As they did, Eren stopped and took a peek into one of the rooms he hadn't been in yet. He marveled at the set, recognizing it from that one talk show Connie was always watching. Sure enough, on the stage, Petra Ral was sitting in one of her chairs, making sure she didn't look like a complete mess before the cameras turned on.

Later on, he would have to make sure to get an autograph; Connie would be so jealous.

...

"Why are we doing this?" Jean whined as he and the others were digging through Mister Levi's wardrobe. To no one's surprise, it was mostly dresses, skirts, Disney princess cosplays, and some other unmentionables. Whatever it was he had, they were all careful not to make anything dirty (which was Levi's only real requirement).

Armin frowned. "Because Halloween is coming up, and none of us could afford any real costumes." He was momentarily distracted by the others trying on their chosen clothes. "We would've been able to, but we had to pay the rest of the bills that came along with the rent.

"Besides, we should be lucky Mister Levi even let us in here at all. You know how picky he gets with any of his stuff. Why do you think he's always using sanitizer on anything we touch?"

When he stopped talking, Reiner stepped out of the back room he was using to dress in. He then asked the others how he looked in the outfit he'd chosen.

"Like you should be standing above a grate and holding down your skirt," Jean said to him, in a rather tasteless fashion. "You know, before you OD on barbiturates."

Reiner did not respond to this, or at least not verbally; instead, he calmly walked walked over to Jean. He looked at him quietly for a few moments, before slugging him right in the face. Everybody else just stared after Jean was knocked out cold.

"To be fair, Reiner," Connie said after a bit more silence. "You do make a gorgeous Marilyn Monroe." With him having taken the words out of their mouths, Marco and Bertholdt just nodded. For the rest of their time, everyone got their outfits and left, choosing the most embarrassing outfit for Jean after he regained consciousness. 


	4. Seafood Special Stupidity

After work one day, Eren and the girls, in an effort to get to know one another (or so Krista told him) went to some cheap seafood restaurant the girls were fond of, for some reason. Of course, as always, Mikasa stayed close by to make sure nothing went completely pear-shaped.

On their way in, Eren tried not to stare at the vaguely familiar car that had crashed into a nearby lamppost. He _did_ stare at the beaten up, bordering on lemon truck parked out front. _That_ one he'd recognize just about anywhere. And he would continue to recognize it until the unlikely day that Marco got a new one. 

Eren's hope that Marco came to the seafood restaurant alone was in vain; at a large table near the center of the place, Marco and the other five were seated and waiting for whatever it was they'd ordered. 

"I told you guys!" Jean's smug, irritating voice could be heard over any other conversations the group was having. "See? He already replaced us with a new posse!" Eren really had no time for his taunting right now, so he fired back with an insult of his own to shut him up. 

"Aren't you late for a trip to the glue factory, horse's ass?" 

Jean evidently couldn't think of anything appropriate to respond with; instead he shrunk back against his chair and sulked like a scolded child. As he did, Eren noticed a large bruise on the side of his face, a pretty bad one. 

...

"So those are your old roommates, eh? Boy did you have problems, I'll bet." After everybody was seated and eating, Ymir was looking on as the other group proceeded to show their usual behaviors. Eren was still pretty embarrassed by their antics, even now. Whether it was Jean chewing with his mouth open, Reiner literally stuffing his face, or Bertholdt just randomly rubbing his face into his own food, it was it was just a nightmare to watch. Eren also didn't like how Jean kept staring at Armin while he was eating.

"Did you shack up with people, or pigs?" Annie inquired. To try and distract himself from her questions, Eren looked around the dining area. Already, he could see a couple of familiar faces. For one, Hanji from the hospital was hiding behind a menu, clearly not wanting any of her patients to know she was there.

At the other end of the place was Mister Erwin and Mister Levi. As Levi was calmly eating a salmon steak (while dressed as Sailor Moon, natch), Erwin was shit-faced to the point of being barely conscious and falling out of the booth. Occasionally, Levi poked him in the face to make sure he wasn't dead. 

Beyond the other typical fare, nothing else. Eren went back to his menu, if only for a little while. He figured it was safe enough to say...anything, really. But it wasn't.

"Think maybe we can start with an appetizer or two-" He was interrupted by Erwin abruptly letting out a horrific shriek. It was one that pierced through the eardrums of all those present. Then, as quickly as it started, it stopped. Erwin dropped back down to the booth table and slammed his face down, having passed out completely now. 

When everyone bothered to look over, they all saw Levi in the process of pulling one of his boots back on. 

...

Barring Erwin making an entire body of diners go temporarily deaf, not much else happened at the seafood restaurant when the group left that afternoon. Ironically enough, all of them ended up at the aquarium (because Armin wanted to go and see all the fish, that's why). 

"Jean, quit doing that," Connie said in response to Jean puffing up his cheeks and pushing his face against one of the glass walls. "It's gonna scare the fish." Of course, Jean ignored him and kept doing it. Then he added some tapping, which no doubt further aggravated aforementioned fish. 

At a different part of the aquarium, Bertholdt stared in awe at the exotic specimens. It was possible that he was imagining himself eating at least one of them. Next to him, Marco tried waving his hand over his eyes, in a futile attempt to get his attention away from the fish. 

The only thing Bertholdt did in any sort of response was lick the glass. Seeing him not actually know he was there, Marco just sighed, pulling at his bandana in agitation. He then left him be when it looked as if Bertholdt was getting a little too into it. Instead, he wandered over to where Reiner and Armin got to. Those two were engrossed in looking at the ocean life section. 

"You think they have an oarfish in here?" Armin inquired. "Some say that when reports in history mentioned 'sea serpents', they were actually talking about those." His eyes darted about near the bottom, attempting to seek out such a creature. "But I also hear they're really shy, so we might not see it if it's there." 

"Huh," was really all that Reiner could say, as he crossed his arms to help him look. "Neat." Armin was still going, being unable to stop geeking out about the ocean, for no apparent reason. Like a good friend, Reiner just listened in and gave responses when he needed to. 

Then he saw something out of the corner of his eye. Turning his head to get a better look, his eyes widened in shock. He interrupted Armin from his ongoing speech about coelacanths. 

"Uhhh, Armin? Does your grandpa come here very often at all?" 

Armin didn't like where this was going. "Once in a while. Why do you ask?" 

Because he didn't turn his head to look, Reiner elbowed him in the ribs and pointed in the direction he wanted him to stare in. To Armin's dismay, he recognized the problem immediately. 

" ** _Oh Grandpa, no_**!" He shouted as he grabbed fistfuls of his own hair. In the water tank, his grandfather was swimming naked whilst fighting an octopus. Once hearing him shout, the others were distracted from whatever it was they were all doing. Then it was all staring in disbelief and awe at what was going on, for what felt like way too long.  

"Hi, Mister Armin's grandpa," Bertholdt said finally as he waved to the old man, who was too busy punching the octopus in the face to respond. 

...

Mikasa had been housesitting for Eren when he went back to help out at the TV station. Although she wasn't too happy about him needing to work late tonight (something about new rules or something similar to that), she put up with it anyway. Now, she found herself searching about his apartment, making sure he wasn't doing anything illegal and/or stupid.

As she did so, she came across a picture taken some time before his graduation from college. She already knew about it because she took the picture. In it, Eren had his arm draped over Armin's shoulders, who himself was giving the peace sign.

Everyone else was doing something understandable, whether it be mundane (Connie doing the bull horns, Bertholdt picking his nose) or ridiculous (Jean lifting up his shirt and sticking his tongue out, Reiner using both hands to give the finger). 

Mikasa then noticed Marco in the bottom left corner, displaying a sheepish grin while scratching the back of his head. Going by the fact that he still had hair, she figured it was taken before he began chemo. 

Despite the circumstances during the time of the photo being taken, Mikasa couldn't help but smile a little. She hoped that Eren would continue to get support from all of them, even in times she couldn't be there for him herself. 

...

After returning home that night, Armin curled up on his futon and buried his face into his thighs. 

The aftermath of the aquarium antics of his grandfather had been a disaster. He wanted to crawl into a hole and just die, rather than explain to the police that the old geezer they arrested was related to him. To make matters even more humiliating, it ended up on the news that night. 

Supposedly, according to the commentary of reporter Nile Dok (or 'Nile Dick', as the others referred to him), it was meant to be some kind of piece for the news' 'Around Town' segment. If the naked screaming old man streaking across the camera was any indication, that wasn't going to happen now. 

Armin sighed in relief when he heard the TV click off. He then flopped over and covered himself with a nearby bedsheet, trying to get to sleep. When the door opened, he kept his eyes shut hoping none of them would try talking to him. It worked, to an extent; they didn't talk _to_ him, but they did talk _about_ him. 

"His mom's dead, his dad's in jail, and his grandpa's nuts," he could hear Jean say to all of them. "I'm amazed he hasn't lost it himself yet-" 

He was shushed at that time, presumably out of concern in case Armin could still hear what they were saying. 

Even with that, he stayed still and listened to them all get ready for bed themselves. By the time Connie had his breathing machine switched on, and Bertholdt landed facedown onto the floor, Armin finally ended up falling asleep. 


	5. The Weather Leaves the Guys all Breathless for Thanksgiving

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeah so happy Thanksgiving and shit even though I despise Thanksgiving

Power outages in the apartment complex were common, to the point of being normal for all the tenants. More often than not, the cause was usually Erwin doing something stupid. Once Levi had to call 911 when he'd found Erwin trying to chew through the wires sticking out of the outside fuse box. No, the people of the complex didn't know how Erwin wasn't dead from that. 

This time, however, the cause was natural in origin; at some point during the night, a thunderstorm began brewing. In the middle of said thunderstorm, a bolt of lightning had struck the aforementioned fuse box. When this happened, it usually meant trouble; although outages were common, any of them at night could be seriously dangerous. Tonight was no different. 

The guys all woke up (except Bertholdt, who somehow was sleeping through all of this) to the sound of Connie gasping desperately for air. Right away, the other three were up, awake, and by his side. Quickly, Jean unhooked the straps keeping Connie's mask on his face. After him, Armin tried loosening his shirt to help him breathe a little better. Then, Reiner pulled him to a sitting position, rubbing his shoulders and back. 

To everyone's relief, Connie managed to wake up and take a deep breath, though with some heavy coughing. All of them waited until he could get to a normal breathing pattern. Now he was merely disoriented as he glanced at all of them. 

"Thanks guys," he somehow was able to choke out. 

...

In the morning, Eren had come for a visit to survey the damage before work. He should've figured it was going to be an interesting day when he saw Little Bo Peep working on the fuse box outside. 

"Hi, Mister Levi!" He called out while on the way to his former apartment. Levi didn't look in his direction; his only greeting in return involved a middle finger with the hand not holding a shepherd's crook. Much as Eren didn't like him doing that, he figured there was no use in trying to do anything about it right now. 

The inside of the apartment was still pretty dark, which actually had a good reason to be this time. Eren could see that through the peephole, before he got his spare key out (Erwin was too coked out to ask for it back when Eren moved out). 

"Hello?" Eren called out when he got the door open. "Armin? Marco? Horse's ass?" 

With no answer, he walked in a little further. He got to the breakfast table before he could feel something rough slide across his leg. He didn't have to look down to know who it was, but he did anyway. 

"Good to see _you_ again," Eren told the alligator. The alligator just looked up at him, before plodding off into the bedroom. 

" _ **Aw goddammit** **!**_ " he heard Jean yell when it was all the way in the room. "Who let _you_ back in?!" 

...

Armin was of course the one to go with Eren while the latter tried getting video footage on his phone. Both remained quiet as Eren kept moving the zoom option back and forth to achieve focus. Armin did start talking when Eren got what he figured was good enough. 

"I thought you had to work today." 

"This _is_ my work," Eren told him as he reviewed the footage. "It's for a broadcast later tonight. And when I get there, I gotta help Mike the cameraman deal with his hangover."

As he talked, Armin kept looking about the property. There wasn't really much to look at normally (much as Mister Erwin and Mister Levi tried, it just wasn't a very nice place to live). Today, though, something was at least a bit off. Armin made sure to let Eren know. 

"Speaking of hangover..." Armin said while tugging on Eren's sleeve, then pointing in another direction. Eren just about dropped his phone when he saw the landlord dangling from a rain gutter. Erwin himself didn't seem to realize this; he just kept hanging off by the hem of his briefs, and groaning loudly. 

"How the hell did that happen?!" Eren shouted. Armin just shrugged and made a sound like 'I dunno' while not looking back at him. Then he took the chance himself to ask a question: 

"Do you need any help getting down, Mister Erwin?" Erwin responded by flinging a half-drank bottle of whiskey at the two, shattering right in front of them. Both of them stared at the smithereens for a few moments, before looking at each other. 

"I'm guessing that means 'no'," Eren said. 

...

Given that Marco's truck only had two actual seats, all of the others had to sit in the back of it. This, of course, meant the four unlucky ones had to try and maneuver themselves in somehow. As they waited for their respective turns, all of them stared at Mister Levi trying to get Mister Erwin down with the shepherd's crook he kept with him. It was either that, or he was deliberately hitting him in the head with it. 

"Why do I get the feeling," Jean started to say, "That the landlord's assistant is more of a landlord than the actual landlord?" Instead of a verbal answer, Jean felt himself be smacked in the cheek. A look to the right revealed that it had been Bertholdt's doing. "What the hell was that for?!"

"I didn't like how many times you said the word landlord," was the response Bertholdt gave him. 

...

At the TV station, Krista and Ymir were poring over the footage that Eren had acquired for them. Krista was smiling at how much was usable in their later broadcast, but Ymir's attention was elsewhere. 

"Damn, your old place is a shithole," she bluntly stated. Krista was about to tell her not to use such foul language at work, but Eren cut back in. 

"Yeah, it is. There's never really enough money to properly fix it back up. I blame the landlord and his assistant. They have...interesting spending habits." He grabbed his phone back and turned off the video footage. "At least the coming holiday might give us all a break from it, though. For me and Mikasa, anyway..." 

**_-some days later, on Thanksgiving-_ **

Even now, after coming at least several times a month, the grocery store deli still wouldn't put up a larger table meant for a sizeable group of people. As a result, with everyone scattered about the dining area, it felt a bit isolated. Not even the Macy's Day parade on TV helped matters. 

Since his mother was still off somewhere in Europe with Floch, and all his friends were amongst themselves, Jean sat at a small table with Marco, picking at his pre-made turkey dinner. About the only correspondence he'd gotten from his mother was a postcard of the Parthenon in Greece. 

It just wasn't really the same without her here with him. But her own happiness was important to Jean, and right now she was happy with Floch. As for his other friends: Connie had Sasha, Armin had Eren and the girls (and later he and his grandfather were going to visit his father in prison), and Reiner and Bertholdt had each other. 

Marco himself was too busy watching the parade, and chowing down on his special chemo patient-friendly dinner. Jean tried to initiate conversation with him, but his efforts only got Marco to raise a finger meaning 'hold on a second'. That didn't stop Jean from trying again and again, however. 

"Uh, Marco-" He raised the finger again. "Hey Marco, you want me to get you some more-" Once more the finger, and this time it stayed raised. "Marco what are you thankful for-" Because Jean seemingly wasn't getting the hint, Marco proceeded to press his finger against his face and gently tapped it against his nose. 

Now seeing that he wasn't getting anywhere, Jean sighed and let him watch the parade. He'd probably leave him be to watch the dog show after it, too. 

...

"Maybe next year, you get to cook for all of us?" Sasha asked Connie when everyone left the deli, and were out in the parking lot. "I know anything you make doesn't come with the risk of food poisoning or parasites." Connie gave some kind of a half-hearted shrug to her question. 

"I'll have to find all my cookbooks. Even now I don't know where they've gotten off too." He then looped his arm with hers. "For all I know, Bert probably sold them for mushrooms. Or he ate them, you never know with him." He looked behind himself at the others. "And speaking of food poisoning..." 

At about halfway to their vehicles, Reiner and Bertholdt had to stop on account of Bertholdt vomiting into a trash can. Reiner kept on massaging his back, but that didn't seem to be doing any good. Nearby, Annie just stared at this happening, while casually sipping at a cup of coffee. 

It couldn't have been food poisoning; it wouldn't be that fast-acting. Bertholdt was probably upchucking because of something else. Meanwhile, Armin was waving goodbye to Eren and Mikasa. 

"Say hi to Grisha and Carla for me, okay?" Mikasa and Eren promised that they would. In turn, they told him to do the same with his father and grandfather. 

"Unless you want to come with us and tell them yourself," Mikasa gave as a suggestion. Eren was enthusiastic in her idea. To their disappointment, he had to decline. They always hated it when he had to do that, but at least this time he had a reason (even if he always had a good reason). 

"It's not often I can get a request to visit my dad approved, so I'm making the most out of it. But I'll pass it on, I promise!" With that, Armin turned and got a ride with Krista and Ymir, giving them instructions on how to get to the nursing home. 

Finally, Jean was walking to Marco's truck, keeping his gaze down towards his feet while his hands were in his pockets. He was still feeling a bit down about what happened earlier, even though it was his fault for trying to bother Marco so much. Still, he felt bad about it now. That feeling intensified a bit when Marco himself caught up to him and walked at his side. 

"So what was it you were trying to tell me about back there, Jean? It seemed pretty important." His cheery demeanor and gentle smile just made Jean feel even worse. To try and save face, Jean waved it off. 

"It wasn't, so don't worry about it. You seemed busy and probably didn't want to talk with your mouth full, anyway." His pace quickened, and now he was about a few feet ahead. He didn't even see Marco's now confused and crestfallen expression, as he got into the passenger side of the truck.


	6. Poker Night, Plentiful Nudity (a.k.a. The Guys Keep Barfing)

As a result of their cheap Thanksgiving dinner, the guys (sans Marco, of course) were all fighting for use of the bathroom the next morning. They knew it was going to be bad; the problem was that they underestimated precisely  _how_ bad. It was bad enough that when the fight over the toilet was finished (it was Armin who won oddly enough, though Connie went in after him to puke in the bathtub), everyone else had to run to find someplace else to vomit. 

Marco had been surprised in his own bathroom, when he saw Jean barge in on him, while tying his bandana on. Jean didn't even bother to say good morning to him before his face landed into the glorious porcelain bowl.

Then came the emetic downpour. It was coming out so fast and so much, some of it ended up splattering onto the toilet and the floor. When Jean finally managed to reach a pause, he reached up and grabbed Marco by the shirt. He was looking right in his face. 

"Marco," he choked out in a way that made it sound like 'Mahgu', "If I don't make it, tell my mom I love her." His expression then hardened, with an added pointer finger for emphasis. "And tell Floch he sucks!" He then let go, and went back to vomiting. Marco didn't dare say anything, since he knew Jean was simply being dramatic. 

...

Meanwhile, all throughout the rest of the apartment, the others weren't faring much better. Besides the aforementioned three, Reiner was vomiting into the nearest garbage can. As for Bertholdt, he had the unfortunate choice of the kitchen sink. Both of them (along with the others, of course) were upchucking to the point of their throats hurting terribly. 

"Aw, God!" Reiner hoarsely shouted out when he was able to briefly hold it off. "Oh God, what have we done to deserve-" He couldn't finish his sentence; another wave of vomit struck him, and back into the garbage can his face went. 

Stumbling out of the bathroom, Connie grabbed hold of the phone and dragged it back into the bathroom with him. He tried not to pull on the cord too much as he dialed Sasha's number, while kneeling back in front of the tub. 

"Hello? Hey, Sasha-" Just like Reiner, he didn't finish his sentence either before he puked again. The ending result made it sound like he was calling her 'Sashuuuurg' instead. 

"Connie?! Aw, Connie, it hit you too?!" Sasha sounded as though she too were in complete distress. It made sense; she'd eaten more than he did. Nevertheless, through their ordeal they continued trying to have some form of conversation. Behind him, Armin looked as if he were having some kind of out-of-body experience. 

Armin had managed to stop throwing up, and just flopped over onto his back. His eyes were glazed over, and wide open. With a shaking arm, he reached upward toward the ceiling and made a grabbing motion. 

"Mommy?" He said in a pitiful whisper. 

...

Once everybody had managed to get as much out of their systems as they could (and grab things they could use as barf buckets), all the guys were seated at the breakfast table. Except for Bertholdt; he was sitting at his usual spot on the couch, trying to find the remote. When he couldn't, he just stood up and turned the TV on. 

Instead of the usual broadcast, the guys all were tuned in to some kind of 'technical difficulties' screen with tinkly music playing with it. The words on the screen had to have been scrawled by hand; they were far too messy to have been done by a computer: 

 _Today's news has been cancelled_  
_On account of the grocery store deli here in town being a health inspector's nightmare_  
_(a.k.a. they're too goddamn cheap to use better quality ingredients for their meals)_  
_The news will return tomorrow if any of us are still alive_  
_Please watch the reruns of various shows or do something actually productive with your time until tomorrow_  
_-Titan TV, Channel 104_

Everyone stared at the screen until the first show began. Bertholdt, being upset about his usual TV schedule getting compromised, tried burrowing under the couch cushions. Seeing this, Reiner grabbed his own bucket and walked over so as to pull him back out. 

"Isn't it bad enough when he does that during the Olympics?" Armin inquired while trying to get a bout of the chills under control. 

...

After an hour or two of watching reruns of _The Petra Ral Show_ (at Connie's request, of course), the guys were left to do something else. Not _all_ of them wanted to watch Petra talk about unruly children, or anything she could manage to turn into some kind of glurgey, saccharine nonsense. 

"I'm amazed you and Sasha are both hot for that woman, Connie," Jean teased while trying to be his usual dickish self. Connie was about to claim otherwise, only to stop and freeze. There was a brief moment of silence before he then ran into the bathroom. All the others could only really watch. 

"He could've just used his bucket if he was gonna throw up again," Reiner stated when he dragged Bertholdt over to the table. 

Marco cringed. "I don't think he's throwing up." The realization dawned on everybody else, and all of them mimicked his facial reaction. In the process, Armin proceeded to vomit into his bucket as well. 

...

Back at his apartment, Eren was unsure if he'd even left his bathroom at all this morning. If Jean were here, he'd surely laugh at him for this. That thought alone frustrated him. In the living room, Mikasa was also experiencing foodborne illness. She was just better at managing it than he was. 

The call for him not to come in today revealed that Krista and everyone else weren't feeling that great either. He could tell from the way Krista was speaking; also Ymir was in the background making the most unholy sounding noises. Eren was actually a bit grateful for this; now he didn't need to think of an excuse not to come in. 

Once he felt as if everything in his stomach was properly upchucked, he crawled back to his living room. Mikasa was sitting on the couch, trying not to throw up herself. Instead, she was helping herself to a glass of water to try and get the puke taste out of her mouth. 

"You sure you don't have to go to work?" Eren rasped out as he struggled to get to his feet. 

Mikasa nodded. "I called in. That way if you get worse, I can be around to help." Eren knew there was no arguing with her (there was never any arguing with her), and besides, she was right. This was one of those times where he wished he still lived with the guys. 

He wondered how they were faring right now. 

...

"I forgot you even had those," Armin said to Marco as the latter was in the process of shuffling a deck of cards. The precision and technique in which he did so was quite a sight to watch. "Those are the ones I gave you for your birthday, right?"

Marco smiled and nodded as he straightened up the shuffled deck. "Well, I had to do something while going through my chemo treatments. Thought maybe solitaire would be a good idea. But since there's more people here, and I'm not currently hooked up to an IV..." What Marco didn't tell the others was that this card game held a sort of hidden motive. It did in the way they were going to play it, anyway. 

"Why..." Jean suddenly began getting his own case of the chills while he spoke. "Why strip poker, though? We all see each other naked all the, ugh...all the time. I think I can go a whole lifetime without seeing..." Here Jean visibly shivered. "...Without seeing Reiner's junk again-"

Then came an abrupt smack upside the head. As Jean was rubbing it, he looked to see that Reiner evidently didn't much appreciate the comment about his dick. 

By this time, Connie had finally exited the bathroom after his embarrassing problem. He exhaled in relief as he took his seat once more. Now he waited for whoever was the dealer to actually hand out the cards, and not try to eat them instead (dammit Bertholdt). 

**_-some time later, with the guys all having lost some clothes (and where the actual game is mostly skipped because the author is lazy)-_ **

It was very awkward and uncomfortable to reach for a barf receptacle when all one had on was boxer shorts and a pair of socks. But Jean had to do it anyway after he got the losing hand  _again._ Everyone else just waited for him to finish what he was doing, before he glumly took aforementioned shorts off. 

"I feel like you're all picking on me," he said after he threw his underwear off somewhere behind him. Reiner, who was leaning back on his chair (completely naked, of course), gave something of a smug-looking grin. It looked as though Jean had to look at his junk again after all. The other four simply looked on, all of them at least shirtless (Bertholdt wasn't playing, but he took his clothes off anyway). 

Inwardly, Marco smiled to himself; he was actually hoping to lose the next hand, if partly to cheer Jean up. The chance to do so came up when the cards were shuffled and dealt again. When he took a peek at his cards, he covered his mouth with his hand to actually grin. 

"What is it, Marco?" Armin asked when he took hold of his own set. "Did you get a good hand?" 

"I think he needs to work on his poker face," Connie added on. 

Then went the usual process, with cards being exchanged, and possible leading hands being showcased. To everyone's confusion, Marco indeed had the worst hand. Even so, he was still grinning. 

"Marco...?" But all that Bertholdt could say was his name; Marco did the usual held-up finger to make him stay quiet. He then stood up out of his chair, and proceeded to untie his bandana. As he was dropping it to the floor, he shook out a growing but still relatively short mop of black hair. 

It was a delayed reaction from everybody. Once they all realized what they were looking at, however, the screaming, cheering, and the "Oh my God!"s began. Then came everyone else standing up with him trying to give him a hug.

...

Eren was back in front of the toilet when his phone buzzed, meaning someone had sent him a text. Wiping the vomit off of his chin, he grabbed it to check. Seeing that there was a photo attached, he raised an eyebrow. 

"Probably horse face sending me pictures of his dick again," he muttered as he opened it up. 

As he expected, Jean was naked. What he _didn't_ expect was everyone else in varying states of undress. He didn't expect the text message either: 

**IN REMISSION!!!!!!**

Eren gasped in delight when he saw Marco's smiling face, along with everyone else's. He could barely contain himself when he went back out to tell Mikasa the good news. 


	7. Disgusting Decorative Dilemma

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm kind of tired of having to mention what Levi is wearing in every appearance he has
> 
> So when any other character mentions a random female anime or cartoon character or the like just assume it's him
> 
> Or use your imagination or something I don't know

"Well, what do you think, Eren?" Having the girls (and Mike the cameraman) decorate a giant tree with all the bells and whistles was oddly magical to Eren. What didn't seem so magical was how expensive the ornaments all seemed; he was sure that the one he was holding alone cost at least a month's worth of his weekly paycheck. It made him nervous just to look at it. 

Once he found a spot for it, though, his nervousness went away. 

"I like it pretty well," he said with a bit of pride. Then Eren stepped back so Mike could push a ladder to the side, and set the star at the very top. As he was doing that, someone else (not with the TV station, though) prepared the camera for filming their little commercial. Quick as he could, Eren ran over and stood next to Annie. 

"All right, we all good?" When the camera began rolling, all of them cried out in unison: 

**_"_ _From all of us at Titan TV, Happy holidays to all of you!"_ **

No sooner did they finish saying that, did Mike suddenly topple over off the ladder, taking the tree with him as he fell. 

And  _then_ the footage stopped. 

...

Seeing the Christmas tree that the guys set up in their apartment, rather than filling them with joy and good cheer, created a sense of gloom and despair. Even so, they tried to make do with it. 

"I don't think it's a bad little tree-" 

"It's an old air freshener with rhinestones glued onto it, Armin," Jean cut him off before taking a swig of what he assumed was eggnog in a can. "It's pathetic, is what it is." Pathetic or not, though, it was going to be what their presents (if any) were all going to go under. Hopefully none of them would accidentally knock into the stand that the air freshener was hanging off of. 

Everyone else was doing their own morning thing: Connie was making pancakes, Marco was folding everyone's laundry up for the week. Bertholdt was chewing on the couch arm, and Reiner was of course trying to get him to stop that. The two of them just watched quietly as this all went on. Outside in the hallway, the loud hum of a vacuum cleaner could be heard. 

When Jean had had enough of doing that, he chugged what was left of his canned eggnog. He then crushed the can against his forehead, chucked it behind him, and belched.

"Yeah, I'm gonna go pay the rent now," he told everyone as he grabbed the money and made to leave. "Hopefully looking at Mister Levi's get up of the day might make staring at that air freshener not so miserable." When he opened the door to the apartment, everyone got to see Mister Levi running aforementioned vacuum cleaner, dressed in a face mask and purple bathrobe. The hair rollers and pink bunny slippers just accented and completed the outfit. 

Everyone then watched Jean hand over the cash, before he made a crack at Mister Levi's morning ensemble. This earned him a knee to the groin, resulting in him falling to the ground and dragging himself back into the apartment. 

...

Later that day, Mikasa was at the local crafts shop, really the only place in town that did _not_ at least vaguely smell of stagnant urine. She had her phone out in order to call or send screenshots to Eren about what decorations he wanted on his tree at home. Or it would be home, once she found one she liked enough to purchase. 

So focused on this task was she, that she didn't notice someone shouting angry gibbering in the aisle next to her. Whoever it was evidently hated the tinkly Christmas music that was playing over the intercom. To be brutally honest, she didn't really like it, either. 

"Everything in this crafts store is so expensive," she murmured to herself. In the end, she just grabbed a few decorations at random and called it good. She then made her way to the section of the store that had all the Christmas trees set up. This part she didn't really want to do either. 

"Too bad I'm not still living with Grisha and Carla," she said again to herself. "They'd help me with this. At least I hope they could." The rage-induced jabbering was still going on. This time, Mikasa was actually hearing it, and was rather annoyed by it. Before she made a decision on trees, she went back and punched the shouter's lights out (turned out to be some whacked-out fucker wearing sunglasses). 

All the other people in the store seemed relieved when the yelling stopped. Mikasa didn't care either way; she merely picked a good-sized tree, and went to go check out. 

...

"Should we all be concerned that Mister Erwin paid for all that with can redemption money?" In the apartment foyer, the guys were now all watching a very cranky Mrs. Claus (with a rather skimpy fur-trimmed red skirt naturally) trying to string up a long line of tinsel around a weirdly-shaped Christmas tree. 

"I'd be more concerned about his assistant," Reiner answered whoever asked that (it was Marco). "One more inch off that outfit, and we're gonna be getting an eyeful of-" 

By then Mister Levi had dropped one of the candy canes he was now hanging up. Bending down to pick it up, he displayed proof that he hadn't put on any underwear. As expected, all of them recoiled in horror. 

"That." 

"Where'd his other testicle go?" Bertholdt asked quiet enough so that Mister Levi didn't hear. 

With this problem being present, all of them were hoping that the weather would hurry up and get better (for some bizarre reason, the weather suddenly began whipping up a massive snowstorm). They were also hoping that Marco's truck would still be functional and still actually there when it did stop. 

**_-sometime later, when the shitty weather finally did stop (kind of)-_ **

All around them, the guys were in awe at what precisely the earlier snowstorm did to the town. Rather than it be a sparkly, pure white wonderland, it looked quite dreary. That may have been from all of the clouds creating an overcast situation. Whatever the reason, it just cast a bleakness in the air. Said bleakness was affecting everyone in some way. 

"Why are we going Christmas shopping again?" Connie asked. "Last I checked, Christmas is still two weeks away. Sasha said that she didn't want me to buy anything for her, either-"

"But we're not all dating Sasha though," Reiner told him. As he spoke, he seemed to be flexing his arms that were resting against the back of his head. Weirdly enough, he didn't seem all that affected by the chilly air. "Last I checked, the only one doing that would be you, Cons." 

Now all the others looked to see if Jean was going to make a comment about how Connie was boning Sasha (or something to that effect). Instead, his eyes were closed, and his head was resting on his chest. As for his hands, they were still unconsciously grabbing at his crotch (Mister Levi's knee was just that powerful). 

Once Marco parked in front of what was technically the mall in town, he poked his head out of the window to see if everyone was still in the back (Bertholdt, having ridden in the passenger's seat pretending to be a dog, ended up sliding out of the truck via his own window). 

"Everybody out now," he told them all. He then couldn't help but give a slightly amused grin at seeing Jean. He then looked over at Armin. "Think you can be the one who wakes him up this time?" 

Armin nodded, before sidling up to Jean. Then, slowly lifting up his arm, he proceeded to slap Jean in the back of the head. 

"Eh? Whazza-" Jean quickly looked about in a disoriented state, before managing to gain some lucidity. He then grimaced as he rubbed the spot where Armin had smacked him, looking over at him now with annoyance. "Hey, if I wanted to be smacked in the head like that, I'd prefer it in the form of an angry dragon." 

He then decided not to get any more explicit, and hopped out the side of the truck, making sure to catch Armin as he made his way out himself. 


	8. Happy Hellidays

The big day was drawing ever closer.

As a result, Connie was baking more and more in preparation. In a strange reversal of roles, Sasha actually had to pull him away from the oven so he could take a break once in a while. But that didn't stop there being a good amount of holiday treats sitting all over the kitchenette. 

"Uh, Cons," Reiner said as he sat at the table with two of the others, "I get you're excited about Christmas, but...We'd kind of like to have brunch at some point. I'm pretty sure Christmas brownies and sugar cookies don't count as that." Jean and Marco nodded in agreement. Meanwhile, Bertholdt was a little too busy humping the refrigerator. 

"Hey Bert?" Armin called out to him as he wrapped presents in the corner, "Can you do something less awkward than that? Like watching  _Rudolph_?

Now, Jean decided to give some unnecessary commentary. "Or bashing your head against the wall?" His comment almost got Marco to snicker, in some sense of out of character schadenfreude. 

...

Connie did indeed make brunch for everyone, or at least he attempted to; it turned out that he was so overworked from baking, he didn't have a whole lot of energy. Not even a half-hour break really helped. Therefore, instead of French toast with powdered sugar, the guys and Sasha were ultimately forced to consume far less grandiose edibles.

"Yecch..." Reiner, for once, actually made his distaste known when he poked at a still partially frozen waffle. The other guys weren't much happier with their meals either; Armin was just eating his extremely runny poached eggs because it was the polite thing to do (and he was admittedly a bit hungry). 

Sasha pouted a little from hearing their groans of displeasure. "You know, he didn't have to make anything for you guys. Just be glad he bothered to cook anything at all." 

Jean scoffed. "He could fry a dirty sock and dip it in gravy, and you'd eat it, Sash."

"He does need to rest," Marco told the others. "Maybe for the rest of the day, we get our own food while he sleeps. Sound good?" 

...

As he peeled the skin off one of the many clementine fruits he'd gotten from Mikasa, Eren watched as the girls decorated around the rest of the studio. He was supposed to be getting the various Christmas specials ready for airing in the evening, but he was wanting to take a break when he got a few hours worth set up. 

Krista had brought several tins of candied fruit and chocolate in for everyone. Eren, of course, wasn't sure if he had been with the station long enough to get one. And even then, he'd have to share with Mikasa. 

As Eren was chewing on a clementine segment, he felt himself get smacked in the back of the head. It took a bit of effort not to choke on the aforementioned segment. When he turned to look, Eren saw Annie standing before him, holding a small box of various Christmas ornaments. 

"These came from the orphanage here in town," she told him when she forcefully handed him said box. "Krista and Ymir want them hung up outside above the entrance." Annie didn't even bother to hear any complaints from Eren; she turned and walked away before he could utter a word. 

...

"Oh, now isn't that precious?" Jean said as he and the others peeked in on Connie taking a nap. "He's like a little angel with with a terrible sleeping disorder that could kill him when he sleeps." This snide remark was greeted with a shoe thrown into his face (courtesy of Sasha), which was reacted to with a somewhat deadpan "ow". 

Sasha went back to capping the half-gallon jug containing distilled water. When she was done with that, she leaned over and kissed Connie on the forehead, before leaving the room. 

"Guess he isn't coming in to work later this afternoon," she told the others when she came back out. "It sucks, because he's the best worker in the cafe." 

"You hit me with one of Reiner's size thirteen shoes," Jean said, though nobody said anything in response to him and his slight nose pain. 

When all was said and done, everyone promised Sasha that they'd keep an eye on Connie (and make sure he didn't try to wake back up and overwork himself again). All of them peeked out the door to say 'see you later' to her, very grateful to have her show up to help them. It also helped that this time, she took some of Connie's numerous baked goods for herself. 

"Do something about your foot odor," Jean said to Reiner a little too bluntly when they all went back into the apartment. 

...

Once Eren had finished his decorating at the station, he was allowed to go home a little early. To his delight, Krista did indeed let him take home a couple tins of sweets. This came as a great relief to him as well; said relief was replaced with dread when he got back to his apartment, though. 

"Mikasa?" He called out when he flicked the light on. "You still here?" He received his answer in the form of a quiet rustling coming from the bathroom. The cold fear in his stomach got worse when he heard a soft object hitting the floor, and a singular curse word followed by muttering. 

Eren really didn't like when she was having her time of the month; even he and Armin weren't safe when this was the case. All he and the others could really do was play it safe, and hope Mikasa wasn't in a bad mood (or suffering too much). Walking to the bathroom, he softly knocked on the door. 

"Hey Mikasa, I got you something-" He was interrupted when the door opened a small amount. An arm shot out and grabbed the tin of chocolates, before going right back into the bathroom. 

"Thank you, Eren," she added quickly before she closed the door once again. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hahahaha that bit with Mikasa was in there because right now I'm having mine
> 
> I'm not supposed to have chocolate though Ahahahahaha


	9. Happier Hellierdays and a Very Crappy Birthday

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy Holidays and Happy Birthday Levi (I think)

It seemed like an eternity before Mikasa came out of the bathroom. Eren tried sitting a short distance away from her, in case her hormones started getting her worked up again. 

"Thank you for that, Eren," she said to him as she lay the now empty chocolate tin onto the table. "I feel much better now." She then took a seat next to him on the couch, looking for the TV remote and readjusting herself to get comfortable (she also didn't want to get blood everywhere). "Sorry I wasn't able to save any for you." 

"No, it's fine, Mikasa," he reassured her before looking for anything that wasn't lame and/or the channel of the station he worked at. "You, uh...You do you." He didn't really say much else to her. All he really did was watch her flip through the channels; all she found, though, were the typical Christmas specials. 

"Do you have cable, Eren?" She asked of him when she glimpsed the third channel airing _Frosty the Snowman_. To her inquiry, he shook his head. 

Then he figured he'd have to elaborate a little: 

"Mom isn't letting me. She says I need to earn it and stop asking for handouts; apparently I've asked for enough as is." Mikasa didn't keep the conversation going, oddly enough. All she did was resume changing the channel before finally just settling on  _A Christmas Story._

...

"I don't trust this Salisbury steak." The guys were all hoping that the TV dinners and leftovers they found weren't too far past the expiration date. It wasn't like they were supposed to wake Connie up to make dinner for them; they promised Sasha that they wouldn't do so. Therefore, the five of them dusted off a microwave hidden somewhere in the cupboards (Connie didn't like using it for obvious reasons). 

Their choices for dinner were unfortunately (though unsurprisingly) slim. Given that they all had to hide such purchases from Connie, going weeks if not months (or years, God forbid) forgetting about them in the back of the freezer was not unheard of. Eventually, it got to situations like this. 

As long as nobody keeled over dead from more food poisoning, it should be fine. 

"How the hell do you do this all day, Bert?" Jean asked of Bertholdt when the two of them were slumped on the couch, watching a random holiday movie. Already, Jean could feel his back crying out in mercy over the horrible posture. Also the couch smelled rather like fart. 

Bertholdt did not answer him. Instead he just kept staring at the TV. Or rather, he alternated between watching TV and shoving his face into a lukewarm bowl of chicken noodle soup. It was odd when he lifted his head up and noodles ended up getting in his hair. 

"Make sure you clean up after yourself, okay Bert?" Reiner told him as he tried to pick aforementioned noodles off Bert's head. "We don't need Mister Levi coming down on us for shit like this."

By this point, all Marco and Armin could really do was watch their roommates be weird. In a way, they sort of envied Connie right now. 

...

When Christmas Day arrived, the guys all took the cookies and other treats that Sasha didn't take with her to the TV station, where Eren worked (since they certainly couldn't eat so damn many baked goods by themselves, and it wouldn't be a good idea to feed any of them to the alligator). 

Part of it was that they sort of pitied those still working on such a joyous holiday. The rest of it was that they needed to get rid of some of the excess before Connie recovered from his culinary burnout. Unfortunately, they chose the worst possible time to show up. 

All of them should've figured that even on Christmas, someone was going to be running the newsdesk. 

In an effort to find Eren quicker, all six of them split up to go alone and make their own searches. Hopefully, not too many people in town were actually watching the news very closely. 

...

"Hello and Merry Christmas," Annie started with her holiday broadcast. "We here at Titan TV hope you are enjoying this most special of days, and hopefully none of your relatives have choked on the turkey yet. We begin today with-" 

She was cut off by a distraction known otherwise as Armin, who was calling out "Eren! Are you here at work yet? Eren!" Several other voices rang out alongside his, like some makeshift, one-sided variation of Marco Polo. The variations included 'Jaeger' and what was probably supposed to be an imitation of a hawk screech. All of them were heard throughout the station, to the irritation of the employees. 

Meanwhile, In her own studio, Petra Ral was going over a vague outline of her Christmas program. Trying to memorize it as she wandered around, she caught wind of something in the back of the stage. Going to investigate, she quickly found Eren hiding amongst some props. 

"Wha...?!" But Eren promptly shushed her. 

"I'm hiding from all those guys out there," he told her in a loud whisper. "If any of them come in here, tell them I'm not here!" 

Petra wasn't really given the chance to reject this; right on cue, Jean poked his head into the currently empty studio. 

"Jaeger! Hey Jaeger!" He caught sight of Petra when walking back onto the stage. "Oh hey, lady Connie and Sasha both masturbate to. You see a guy with black hair, green eyes? About yay tall, looks like he's about to choke a bitch?" 

From backstage, Eren grumbled, "That bitch'll be you if you don't leave." 

"I'm afraid I haven't," she told him. To this Eren slumped in relief. He made sure to thank Petra when Jean left. 

...

Levi retained his stoicism as he stared down at his designated birthday baked good: a giant, poorly decorated cupcake that smelled more than vaguely like tequila. Across from him sat Erwin, doing his best to endure a wicked hangover. 

"It's still a bit raw on the inside," he told Levi as he rubbed his temples, "but it should still be edible. Oh, and..."

He pulled out a small package from under their table. "You're going to...to want that when 'he' shows up." 

By the time Erwin finished talking, Levi had already unwrapped his gift: a semi-automatic pistol that was pre-loaded. At the very least, he raised an eyebrow at this. Then the door to their kitchen burst open, revealing who Erwin was talking about. 

"Eyyy," Levi's uncle Kenny exclaimed, disregarding the door he'd just turned into splinters. "How's my favorite nephew?! Just thought I'd come wish you a very Happy Birth-" 

Without any more hesitation, Levi ended up aiming his new gift and shot Kenny right in the face. All Erwin did was cover his ears right when Levi pulled the trigger. 

"I tried my best to keep him from coming," Erwin said when he uncovered them. "But I hope today wasn't a complete bust because of him."

Levi waited until his pistol cooled down enough, before pressing his lips to it. He did the same to Erwin on his forehead. 

"Thank you," he muttered, before standing to his feet and dragging Kenny's headless body outside by the leg. Erwin watched as he then proceeded to swing the corpse into a nearby dumpster. Kenny's leg was sticking out from underneath the lid when Levi returned, doomed to rot and be left forgotten. 

Maybe his skeleton could be used for a Halloween decoration in some way later on. 


	10. The Netflix Death Note movie is awful (but you didn't need me to tell you that)

"If I end up stubbing my toe on one more gallon bottle of distilled water, I'm going to punch a hole in the goddamn wall!" 

Going by the shouting and cussing coming from the bedroom, Connie and Armin guessed that Jean was up now. He also sounded like he got up on the wrong side of the bed. Connie grimaced from hearing 'distilled water', while he was stirring up some cream of wheat. 

"Not my fault I got terrible sleep apnea," he said to Armin. "If Jean wants to pay for me to get surgery, he can go right ahead."

Trying to speak over Jean's pain-induced hollering, Armin attempted to make small talk (or at least what he'd consider small talk). "Apparently, we're supposed to be on the lookout for a possible murderer. She couldn't get a good look at their face, but whoever did it was dressed like Daisy Duke. 

"Then again, that woman Hitch was the one saying that, so..." 

He trailed off, and let Connie continue making breakfast in relative peace (relative because Jean wouldn't shut the fuck up). He actually did start getting some peace when Jean yelped and went quiet. This was followed by something thudding to the floor and Reiner shouting, "Some of us are actually trying to sleep!" 

...

Taking down the Christmas tree in the station proved to be far easier than setting it up, thankfully. All they really had to do was topple it over and take off any ornaments that didn't shatter into pieces. There had been a 'no fragile materials' rule put in place, and this was presumably why. 

Eren and Krista watched as Annie and Ymir proceeded to knock over the giant tree. Next to them, cameraman Mike was just trying to unwrap a piece of the leftover Christmas candy; this was easier said than done, on account of his upper body being all bandaged up. When he inevitably dropped it, he groaned and tried to pick it back up. 

"Uh..." Eren couldn't help but comment on Mike's problem. "You need any help there?" Mike shook his head, as he continued struggling and stuck his tongue out. 

Krista just sighed a little at what was all going on. "I get the feeling that if I hired more people to work here, things wouldn't be so bad. But most people don't really want to work with all these people. They don't even want to work with Petra Ral, and she's basically a celebrity in this town." Hearing this gave Eren an idea.

"You know, I got this...friend? Foster sister? Whatever? Maybe she can help out around here. She can occupy her time better, and she won't have to keep calling me to see where I'm at." Much as he loved Mikasa, sometimes the whole 'keep an eye on him' bit was a little grating. Hopefully this way his phone bill wouldn't be so high if this worked. 

At least Krista was giving the idea  _some_ consideration. 

...

Pressing an ice pack against the shiner forming on his face, Jean scowled as he stirred his breakfast around in his bowl. 

"Of all the things you had to throw at me, Reiner," he spoke up, "It had to be the damn alarm clock. And did you have to throw it so hard?" 

Reiner just snorted and crossed his arms. "It was the closest thing I had to get you to shut up." Everyone else was just quietly eating, save for Bertholdt. All _he_ was doing was sitting at his usual spot on the couch. He didn't have his own bowl because he'd dumped it onto his head (and it was still there). 

"Have your shrooms kicked in, Bert?" Marco asked of him. Bertholdt just lifted a hand up and waved it in front of his face, before dropping it back down. 

"Starting to." Then he just sat there staring at the blank TV screen, before before lifting his hand up again. This time, he had it in the bull horn gesture. He held it up for a few moments before rasping out "...Rock on." So caught up was Bert in his rising trip, that he barely realized he'd reached down and started petting the alligator. 

"Good doggy." 

...

Unwilling to get out of bed by himself, Erwin was pulled off of said bed a naked, drooling, hungover mess. He was then dragged out into the office by an almost equally as nude Levi. Once Levi did manage to pull Erwin out and behind his desk, he grabbed a bucket of cold water he had sitting nearby and threw it on him, bucket and everything. Erwin's reaction was an intense one. 

"Levi?! What-" He stopped to spit out any water that got in his mouth. "What do you think you're doing?" Now Erwin looked to see the bucket that bounced off his head. "Oh...Is it Friday night already?" 

In response to this stupid observation (and the fact that that had become a common occurrence on Friday nights by now), Levi just smacked his forehead. He then turned to fish a pair of slacks out from behind the office desk, and attempted to get them onto Erwin without much difficulty. 

Of course, Erwin couldn't really help it if he kicked Levi in the face a few times (he was still pretty unsteady). Levi managed it, though, before dragging Erwin outside for whatever it was he was intending to do. 

...

Outside, a large bonfire erupted in the front yard of the apartment complex. Everyone in the apartment (even the alligator, since Bertholdt was carrying it in his arms now) ran to the sliding door to be greeted by it, and a smell of charcoaled pine needles. It didn't take a genius to know what was getting burned. 

"I hope Mister Levi has a permit to do that," Marco told the others when they all came out to get a closer look. 

"You know he doesn't," Connie said to him while shrugging. Right at that moment, Levi threw something onto the fire that turned out to be incredibly noxious; the resulting smoke was thick and black, bad enough to cause all of them to begin hacking and wheezing. In an effort to try and keep any of the fumes from getting breathed in, they all ran back into the apartment. 

It did open up a little bit for a brief moment, but that was so Marco could shoo the alligator back outside. 


	11. The Grass isn't always Greener; Sometimes There Isn't Any

There was but one other individual that the guys hated getting in their section of the apartment yard. However, they preferred the alligator (who seemed to have taken an immense liking to Bertholdt, for some reason) over this visitor. He didn't seem to have any concept of time, either. 

His latest unwanted arrival came at five in the morning. Had Reiner not gotten up to use the bathroom at that time, he probably wouldn't have noticed.

"Ah, great," he grumbled before going to wake up the others. Once he got them all up (and flipped Jean out of the army cot he used for a bed), he gestured for all of them to go out into the main room. All of them, besides Jean of course, were a bit slow to awaken properly. 

"Eh? Whazza...Wha's happenin'...?" Connie didn't have his mask or his machine off yet, muffling his words a little. Still in a fatigue-induced stupor, he slapped his night stand a few times until he found the button to his machine. By the time he also got his mask removed, everyone else was pulling their clothes on, and Reiner went to go wake up Marco. 

"What's going on, again?" Armin asked while rubbing his eyes.  

"I'm guessing it starts with 'L', and ends with 'andlord passed out in front of the sliding door again'," Jean told him as he pointed outside towards Erwin. 

Precisely how their landlord hadn't yet keeled over dead from his severe alcohol usage, nobody in the apartment knew (besides possibly his assistant, and they all knew he wasn't talking if he did). They usually just tried to ignore him and give their rent money to Mister Levi. 

As Reiner and Marco now went to go get Levi, the others just continued staring at Erwin's unconscious body. Then, Bertholdt grabbed a random pool stick they had in the apartment (according to the previous owner of the complex, their apartment used to be a game room). He then reached out through the sliding door, and poked Erwin in the ass with it. 

...

Later that dreary morning, Eren came to visit the guys before he went off to work.

As usual, some bizarre and/or random shit was happening somewhere on the premises. In this case, Mister Levi was outside beating a few of the rugs that usually were situated in the guys' apartment. What made it so awkward, especially in this weather, was that Levi was doing it in nothing but thigh high boots and a pink Hello Kitty gun holster. Next to him on the ground sat Mister Erwin, presumably very hungover and rubbing his temples. 

This time, Eren decided to forgo his usual greeting. Levi usually just ignored him or flipped him off anyway. 

Strangely, when Eren entered the apartment, it was quiet. No one was around, not even that damn alligator. Out of worry, he pulled out his phone and dialed Armin's number. 

"Hello-" 

Armin was cut off when Eren proceeded to bombard him with demands to tell him where he was. Pinching the bridge of his nose, Armin waited until he could get a word in edgewise. 

"We're fine, Eren. We're at Sasha's house." In the background, the others were going about their usual shenanigans. Simply put, Sasha was going to have to get a new toaster once Bert was finished demolishing it. "The reason we're here is so Mister Levi can clean our apartment. You don't smell Mister Erwin's puke?"

Eren was about to say he didn't smell anything, before a horrid stench finally came to be known to him. His face crumpled up in disgust, as he doubled over and made the ugliest sound. 

"Nasty, isn't it?" Armin responded once Eren was done venting his displeasure. 

...

On Armin's end, the others were making themselves a little too at home. Jean made certain to let him know, if only to interrupt and annoy Eren on the other end. 

"Hey Armin," he said to get his attention, while holding a familiar white stick in between a thumb and finger. But Armin quick glanced at him and gave the usual raised finger. Hence, the waiting until Armin was done with his call. 

"We'll try and meet up as soon as possible, okay?" After he said his goodbye and hung up, he then turned to Jean. "All right, what did you need?" 

Jean held up the piece of plastic he didn't seem to want to hold. "I used one of Sasha's pregnancy tests for ha-has, and it came out positive. What do I do?" He took a quick glance at the others, before looking at Armin again. "Also Bert just pissed on the living room carpet."

The only thing Armin could really do while hearing all of this was to stare incredulously. Sasha wasn't going to like that second development too much when she found out. 

...

A week later Jean found himself in Doctor Hanji's office, completely naked from the waist down and laying down on an exam table. At the group's insistence, he had to make an appointment, due to the fact that a positive pregnancy test could be very bad news for men. 

"So what, are you like the only doctor in this shithole of a town?" He lifted his head up and asked of Doctor Hanji, who was currently pulling her gloves on and setting things up. 

Hanji shrugged. "The only halfway competent one. Unless you want to go see 'Doctor' Bozado, and his 'specialization' with 'back alley vasectomies'."

"...I don't like how many times you used the air quotes there, Doc," Jean said as he lay back and had Doctor Hanji wheel over in front of his junk. At that very time, examination was in progress. 

...

Meanwhile, out in the waiting area, the others had a sound-only rendition of said examination in progress. To busy themselves to pass the time, they read the paper, watched muted closed captioned television, or chewed on their feet. 

"I must say, it isn't often I get male patients that shave down there. Looks like a pretty close one, too."

"Yeah, the guys hated it when I kept using theirs. Well, maybe they shouldn't have such sharp razors."

This got the five of them to cringe; far too often one of them had nicks or dirty razors whenever they needed to remove some excess body hair. Jean had a good scolding (or face punch if it were Reiner), but it took getting his own before any of _that_  really stuck. 

"So I hear your mother's remarried again," Hanji spoke up before then stating "all right, lift it up so I can check them out more thoroughly. So what number is she on now?" 

Jean scoffed. "Her fifth. I'm getting real tired of her marrying men she barely knows. If she would just -whoa, hey there-, just get a job, I'd lay off her a bit.

"And do you know the really awkward bit? One of her ex-husbands from a few years back is currently my landlord."

"Alcoholic or crossdresser? Because I know both of them. Got karaoke with them later tonight, in fact." It was awkward, if not a little bit disturbing, to hear the two go back and forth while one was basically fondling the other's genitals. Still, the other five tried not to focus on it. 

In an attempt to have it be more effective, Armin pulled out his phone and dialed Eren. 

...

In the break room at work, Eren was about to partake in a tasty homemade sandwich when his phone rang. After checking to make sure it _wasn't_ Mikasa saying she changed her mind (she started at the TV station tomorrow) he sighed in relief to see that it was Armin instead. 

"Hey Armin," he said with his mouth full. "Guess what! I get to learn how to run the cameras! Just in case I have to fill in for Mike, but still! Isn't that great?" Eren had said all of this so quickly, Armin didn't have all that much of a chance to return with a proper greeting. 

"Yeah, it is." In order to try and better ignore the conversation in the exam room, he stood up and walked a few feet away. "Is, uh, um...who, who all works there again?" He actually knew their names very well; he just needed to have some sort of conversation starter. 

Eren paused to finish his bite of sandwich. "Well, there's me, then Annie, Christa sort of runs the whole thing, she's got Ymir helping her. There's also Mike the cameraman, and Petra Ral. You know, the one with the talk show or whatever. Oh, and I got Mikasa a job here, too-" 

"All right, Mister Kirstein," Doctor Hanji could be heard, even at a short distance. "Now I gotta take this thing and cram it up into you and see if there's anything that shouldn't be in there." A brief pause ensued, followed by Hanji saying, "Yeah, try again." This was then followed by a choking sound. 

...

While Armin was chattering away, the others were now unable to ignore Jean in the other room any longer. All they could do was sit in mortified silence. While they did this, Jean's sounds of discomfort were gradually turning into something that was...not discomfort. 

"Did I leave the stove on back at the apartment?" Connie whispered to Marco. 

Marco shook his head. "If you did, we'd be getting a phone call from one of the neighbors by now." He then looked down at the floor and frowned. "Bertholdt, please stop that." 

No sooner did Reiner walk over to drag Bertholdt away, did all of them suddenly hear Jean crying out in a most suggestive manner. Armin turning his head meant he also heard of it. Now all of them waited for either Jean or Hanji to talk again. 

"Well, I learned something new about myself today," said Jean. 

On the way home after the appointment, they all silently swore to each other: _Let's hope that was worth the utility bill we're forgoing to pay for that._


	12. Never Fry Bacon Naked

When he saw the bathroom door open just a crack at six in the morning, Connie rolled his eyes and went to go check it out. As he did, he completely ignored the apartment door being slightly ajar as well. As he got closer, he could hear running water. He sighed and opened the door, ready to scold whoever it was. 

'"Bert, we've been over this," he began. "There aren't any voices coming from the water-"  Connie was just a bit stunned when it wasn't Bertholdt in their bathroom; it was in fact Mister Levi, completely naked and shaving his body hair. The two of them just stared uncomfortably at each other, not entirely certain how to respond.

Then Levi just resumed dragging his razor across his skin. Not once did he break eye contact. After what seemed like way too much time, Connie stepped backwards and silently closed the door. 

...

By now, Sasha had learned what days of the month were designated as Laundry Day. They were the days when Jean wandered about the apartment naked from the waist down. It spooked her the first few times, but eventually she got used to it. Today was Laundry Day, evidently. 

"Mornin', Sasha," Jean greeted her with.

"Mornin', Jean," she came back with. As she stepped into the apartment, he went back to scratching his bare ass, and drinking orange juice directly out of the carton. He stopped only to belch, then went right back to his task at hand again. 

On the couch sat Armin and Reiner, trying to get their dirty clothes sorted as best they could. As for Marco, he had taken over making breakfast this morning while Connie stared tiredly at the day's paper. 

Long story short, it was a pretty typical start to their day. The only one Sasha didn't see was Bertholdt, and he was in the bathroom screwing around with the shower. Also he was screaming like an idiot in there.

Not letting it all bother her, Sasha took a seat next to Connie. She then waited until Marco served breakfast before asking anything. 

"So...When do you all plan on leaving?" 

...

"Now all you need to do is convince Armin, and it'll be like old times, sort of." Mikasa seemed a bit more light on her feet than usual, as Eren led her into the station to start her first proper day on the job. 

Eren grinned a little. "Yeah. Except we'd all be at a TV station instead of detention." Both of them chuckled at that briefly, before stopping and getting themselves more composed. 

The reception for Mikasa was nice enough. None of the other workers really bothered her. Most of them were really more occupied with their tasks at hand. Mikasa did take more than a passing gaze at Annie, however. 

"So, anyway, you're basically going to be doing the same things I do around here." Eren figured the best thing to do was to make sure Mikasa knew her tasks. "That means bringing drinks and snacks, getting the primetime TV shows set up, making sure none of the other staff are dead..."

As he spoke, she nodded for each thing he ticked off. Truth be told, she didn't really want a job here; she just wanted to keep an eye on him. 

...

Hopefully Sasha brought enough cash for the guys to change into much-needed quarters. And hopefully the rinse cycle would be enough to distract Bertholdt; the last thing all the others needed was him trying to horn in on everything else they were doing (he couldn't be trusted with their change). 

It was doing a good enough job so far. He just needed to quit pressing his face against the door to the washing machine. 

"He's like a five year old," Jean said to Armin as he tried to get something out of the claw machine the laundromat had. "A five year old that does shrooms and might have a bad case of pica." 

The claw then dropped the stuffed animal he was trying to get. He growled at it, and was about to try again before Armin stepped in and stopped him. 

"Let me try," he told him. 

At the other end of the laundromat, Sasha was in deep contemplation over what snack food she wished to get. Her only real hope was that the foodstuffs weren't too far past the expiration date. She was taking so long to decide (even for her), that the other three were actually getting worried. 

"Should I get Snickers or Twix?" She finally asked of them all while scratching her head. Resisting the urge to facepalm, Reiner stood up and walked over to the machine. He stood at the front of it, seemingly in thought with stroking his chin and everything. Then Reiner turned to the side, repeating his action. 

He then quickly readied a fist and slammed it hard into the side of the machine. The force from the impact forced quite a few of the snacks within to fall down into the retrieval chute. His job done, Reiner went back to his chair that he'd been sitting in. 

"There you go," he said to her as he held his arms behind the back of his head. 

Sasha was a bit stunned that he did that, and that it actually worked. She couldn't really say much else other than, "Thanks" before grabbing her edible loot. Everyone else ignored the huge dent in the side that had newly formed on the side of the machine. 

**_-some time later-_ **

Everyone except Reiner and Bertholdt had finally began to fold their freshly laundered clothing. It would take a while, considering all their laundry came out in the form of a giant wad held together with static electricity. 

"Ow," Jean muttered in a deadpan voice as he was zapped with said static. "Ow. Ow. Which one of us got the fleece? Whoever you are, you're an asshole with poor taste." As he held it up, Marco leaned in and squinted at the tag (they didn't bother sorting properly anymore). 

"I think that's yours, Jean." The other three stifled their laughter. Jean's face fell, realizing he basically called himself an asshole with poor taste. By then, Reiner came up to all of them, a serious look on his own face. 

"We got a problem," he said to all of them as he pulled out a pair of pants behind his back. 

Jean snorted. "Bert's jeans. That _is_ a problem." This earned him a dope slap from the person sitting next to him (in this case, Connie). 

Reiner glared. "Not the jeans themselves, you moron. It's what wasn't with them." Everybody stared at Reiner, who pinched the bridge of his nose and went on. "We have Bertholdt's clothing. We do not have Bertholdt." By then it finally occurred to the rest of them. After he said this, Sasha looked up to the TV that was on in the laundromat. What she saw made her eyes grow large. 

"I think I know where he went, guys," she said to them while pointing at the screen. All of them then made similar reactions to her, then abandoned their half-folded laundry to run out to Marco's truck. 

...

"Well, isn't this an interesting way to start your job at the station," Eren told Mikasa as they and the news crew were on the scene at another part of town. 

The call that the station received earlier was admittedly a rather common one. There wasn't much reaction to hearing 'maniac on rooftop of Denny's' nowadays; the only question was which maniac it was this time (the town was abysmal in many ways, which included some of the populace). 

Already, cameraman Mike was filming the whole thing. He kept the camera pointed right at the roof, looking for any sign of the so-called 'maniac'. Since their usual 'outside' reporter was unavailable (probably passed out in his apartment for some reason), Ymir had to take over. 

"See if this damn thing even works," she muttered as she tried to get her microphone to get to function properly. "Okay, we on?" As she was dealing with that, Eren, Mikasa, and Krista went closer to the building. Once he got a better look, Eren couldn't help but make a disbelieving face. Both girls noticed, but it was Krista who spoke up:

"Eren, do you know him?" 

Eren nodded. "That's my old roommate Bertholdt. He's not a maniac, he's just...on stuff all the time." Now Eren looked about, seeing a beat up truck drive up to Denny's. "Oh, good! They're finally here..."

...

As everyone got out to see Bertholdt hiding up on the rooftop, already Jean was running his mouth. 

"Damn... First the toilet at the laundromat backs up, and now this." He looked over at Reiner. "Do something. He's _your_ problem." This time, instead of smacking him like he usually would, Reiner just glowered and approached. Everyone else looked on in nervousness and embarrassment as he tried to talk Bertholdt down.

Now that Connie looked about the gathering crowd, now it was his turn to facepalm. When the others glanced over to see why the hell he was doing that, he pointed over towards their landlord and his assistant. They weren't too far away, so they could hear what was being said. 

"I can't believe I managed to stay sober long enough to get myself together," Erwin muttered as he pinched the bridge of his nose. "And this ends up happening." He then glanced down and over at Levi (who today was dressed as a Southern belle). In turn, Levi looked over and up at him. "When we get back, find out which apartment he lives in. Then raise the rent." 

Levi nodded. As he did, Jean could be heard shouting "Dammit Bert!" 

Things were really going to suck once _this_ was all over. 


	13. Hopefully That's Covered by Insurance

Jean would never understand how suddenly his luck turned in regards to claw machines. It used to be he could get multiple prizes regardless of the claw size every time. Now it was a miracle if he got one every so often. His misery over all of this was quite a source of slapstick for the others. 

"Why is it," Eren asked the others one day in some "vintage" (a nicer of way of saying 'decrepit') arcade, "that watching a horse-faced grown man wearing a Minnie Mouse shirt cuss out a claw machine makes my day? I honestly don't know if that can get any funnier to me-" 

As if to prove him wrong, right when Jean was finished with his rant, a piece of the ceiling broke off and landed on Jean's head. 

"Ow! Ah, son of a bitch!" Jean then proceeded to start up about _that_ , while holding his head, as he went back to join the group to leave the place. Shortly after they did, the last two people anyone would expect to wander through an arcade (even a crappy one that really barely qualified as one anymore), wandered through the arcade. 

...

"Just a moment." Seeing Erwin sober for more than a few hours was surprising (and relieving). Seeing Levi dressed like Goldilocks wasn't as surprising. That sort of thing was just normal for everyone that knew him. He now stood there, watching Erwin screw around with the claw machine while eating a very suggestively shaped popsicle. 

Instead of actually playing the game like a normal person would, though, Erwin did something else entirely after a bit. He proceeded to rip off one of his sleeves, wrapped his hand up with it, and punched the glass casing. Levi stepped back a few paces so as not to accidentally step on any shards of glass. 

"Here we are," Erwin told him when he got back and handed him a stuffed toy duck. "I'd get you something better, but I've already visited Mister Pixis for the week." He paused, then added "Happy early Valentine's Day, Levi" to that. In response, Levi got on his tiptoes, and waited until Erwin leaned down so he could kiss him on the cheek.

Then he walked behind him and climbed onto his back. He pointed in the direction he wished to go in.

"Again with this? Very well."

...

"When do you think he'll be done?" 

The next day, Reiner and Armin were at the gym, the latter being the former's spotter (not that that was a good idea; Armin wasn't exactly a powerhouse). It was the only way to really pass the time before Jean came back from being used as a medical guinea pig. though. 

Reiner looked up after Armin asked his question. "Uh...Gonna go with 'any minute now'. Don't matter to me, as long as we get enough to help pay the rent." None of the others had really forgiven Bertholdt for that half-naked stunt he pulled. It meant having to cut even more unnecessary (and a few actually necessary) things from their budget. 

"Still, isn't getting too many bad for his health?" 

To this question, Reiner scoffed. "You seen him lately? He's been so angry, that his anger might overwhelm him if he keeps at it."

"And a lot of that rage comes from his mother being married to Floch," Armin guessed. 

"Bingo." 

The both of them continued with the bench pressing, before moving on to push-ups.

"...Thirteen, fourteen, fifteen..." Armin kept count as he sat on Reiner's back, going up and down at a controlled pace. "Twenty, twenty-one, twenty-two, twenty-three, twenty-four..." Armin had gotten some ways through his counting when Jean was finished with his medical jabbing process. 

Armin kept counting mentally when he saw him walk up to the other two. "How'd it go? Were there any serious problems?" 

"Uh..." Jean looked down at his arm, before slapping it. To all of their concerns, it jiggled back and forth as if it were boneless. He thrust it forward at them, making it start flopping. "That, that might be a problem." 

...

Although it was still a few days before Valentine's day, everyone was getting into the spirit in their own little ways. Most of the guys still were single, but managed to celebrate nonetheless. Connie was baking Valentine's cookies for everyone (and making sure Bertholdt didn't get into the dough with Reiner's help). Sitting at the breakfast table, Marco watched Jean continuously peek out the door. 

"Jean, it'll get here when it gets here," he tried to tell him. This wasn't good enough for Jean, however. 

"Hey, Mom told me my package arrives today, and dammit, I'm grabbing it before any of you do!" He went back to watching outside, his gaze intense. "You guys don't need to know what's in there..." Reiner considered making a wild guess to test Jean's reaction, but ultimately decided against it. 

On the couch, Armin watched his visiting grandfather try to remember where the hell he was. 

"Eh? Is this my house?" Grandpa Arlert inquired, stating the just mentioned obvious as he looked about the place. 

"No Grandpa," Armin said to him, starting off in a deadpan, monotone voice. "You live in a nursing home. Now can you please put your clothes back on before we visit dad later?" This didn't get the result Armin wanted, so he tried again. "At least put your shorts on before Sasha gets here." 

...

Eren couldn't think he could eat all the chocolate Mikasa had gotten for everybody at the TV station. He, of course, had the lion's share, much to the displeasure and jealousy of the other workers there. He wanted to offer some of his to them, but Mikasa wouldn't let him. 

He at least tried to eat it all in secret while everyone else was working. Nothing edible so much as got near Eren's mouth when he helped out otherwise; he didn't want cameraman Mike staring at him while he checked to see if all the cameras were working properly. 

During commercial break, he did see Mikasa hand something a little bulkier than chocolate over to Annie. Raising an eyebrow, he made his way over to her when she walked away to someplace else. 

"If it's your birthday today," he asked of her once they were side by side, "then shouldn't you be the one getting presents, instead of giving them to others?" 

Mikasa shrugged. "I can buy my own presents. Besides, I needed to pawn off my old _Garfield_ books to somebody." Sure enough, when Eren glanced over his shoulder, he saw Annie unwrapping her gift, and almost immediately begin to read _Garfield at Large_ after giving it some kind of once-over. 

...

Eventually (which felt more like 'too damn long'), Jean's package arrived (which baffled everyone including him, since it was Sunday). With his good arm, Jean shoved the apartment door open and tried carrying it into the shared bedroom. The others offered their assistance, but he was adamant. 

"I really don't want you guys to look in here, so..." He attempted to open the bedroom door by slamming his shoulder into it, to no initial avail. When he did get it open, he ended up flying onto the floor facedown. All Jean could really do at that point was flop onto his back and hope he didn't break anything. 

"Can one of you get that?" He pointed to the door as best he could. After a brief moment of silence and stillness, Bertholdt strode over and pulled it shut. As he was walking away, however, Jean evidently had another problem:

"Oh God, not you again! No! There's nothing in there for you, you scaly little fucker!" Now he was shouting at the others again. "Guys! Guys, that damn thing got in again! I can't get up because I don't wanna let go of my package-" This part was punctuated by Reiner and Connie suppressing their juvenile chuckles. 

All of them just kept listening in on Jean's distress on the other side of the door, struggling in vain to tell the alligator to go away. 


	14. The Chapter Number and the Related Holiday are a Coincidence

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fairly short chapter because I don't know

Going by the loud noises being heard through the thin walls of the apartment complex Valentine's night, the guys figured that the landlord was getting face-fucked by his assistant. There was also the sound of a riding crop being smacked hard against flesh, and some guttural moaning of pleasure.

No amount of pillows or fingers in ears could properly muffle everything.

Therefore, all the guys (even Bertholdt) were left wide awake in their various sleeping implements; Connie didn't even bother turning his machine on (there was no sense in wasting distilled water if he wasn't getting any sleep). It just became infinitely more awkward when they could then hear Mister Erwin begging to swallow Mister Levi's cum. For Jean, that was the last straw. 

"Fuck this. I'm taking my chances with the alligator." In no time, he was up with his pillow and blanket and out the room. When the others could hear the patio door being opened and shut, they knew he was serious. Apparently he preferred the company of a cold and scaly reptile over whatever Mister Erwin and Mister Levi were doing. 

...

Whatever everybody was thinking when they had that fiasco back at Thanksgiving, they probably weren't thinking it now. Not when there was some discount chocolate to obtain and consume (and some good kinds too). There was also some Easter chocolate for that upcoming holiday. 

Whatever the occasion had been or would be, Eren found both amusement and horror in watching his co-workers and friends go hog wild over getting some delicious and cheap treats. He could actually hear a few punches being landed over some particularly coveted pieces. 

"I got enough for both of us," Mikasa said to him when she appeared at his side. Indeed, her selections went up to under her chin. While Eren appreciated her going to all that trouble, now he couldn't get any of it for himself. 

But then, seeing what was happening in front of him right now (he's pretty sure Ymir just tackled Jean for a big heart shaped box she wanted to get for Krista), that was probably a good thing. 

...

Last night was evidently a good one, going by the results of it. Unfortunately, he couldn't remember everything that had transpired. 

Erwin, once again, was nursing a hell of a wicked hangover while leaning against the toilet. To his confusion, the seat had been encrusted with salt at some point in time. Along with that, he was achy all over; he was quick to discover the reason for that, however. 

"When did we get even get a riding crop, anyway?" He asked the sexy cowgirl sitting on the edge of the bathtub, while rubbing his temples with his fingers. Levi didn't give him an answer. Rather, he grabbed a broom they had in their bathroom and reached over with it, running the bristly end of it over Erwin's back. 

Erwin groaned when he felt those bristles drag across his back. "I must've been so intoxicated, since I can barely feel that." The brushing paused, which made him look right over at Levi with a look of annoyance. "Now at what point did I tell you to stop doing it?" 

With that, the brushing continued. 


	15. Too Bad Leap Year can't be this year (or every year)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Yeah this isn't really any sort of comedy anymore it's just depressing I know
> 
> Also it's short because I ran out of ideas

If the milk hadn't been long past the expiration date, he'd have used milk with his hot chocolate. But it had been either drink mediocre hot chocolate, or end up with a raging case of the shits. Right now, he really didn't need that second one in the early morning. 

Levi (who was currently totally naked) sipped at his aforementioned hot chocolate made with water as he stared down at a hungover Erwin, who was loudly groaning away while holding a half-drank bottle of sangria. Feeling a severe pang of disappointment in him, Levi set down his mug and looked in the fridge for any bottled water.

Once he found it, he lifted Erwin's head up by the hair and shoved the bottle opening into his mouth. Like a thirsty yet obedient pet, Erwin gulped it all down. After it was all gone, he belched and then looked up at Levi. 

"You're so good to me," he told him before passing out. Levi just pulled a nearby quilt over him, and patted him on the head. He then sat back down and resumed drinking his hot chocolate. 

...

The temptation to consume the entirety of the Easter candy was becoming far too great. As a result, the guys had to take drastic measures. And evidently, 'drastic measures' meant 'hiding it all everywhere at the TV station and probably pissing Eren and all of his co-workers off'. 

"Hey!" Ymir walked into Krista's office while she and Eren were trying to figure out what was going on. "...The fuck is this?" She gestured to an enormous 'cookies n' creme' candy rabbit she was holding fairly tightly. Its general appearance in its packaging made it clear that she'd sat on it. "If this is 'sposed to be some kind of early April Fool's joke, I ain't fuckin' laughing."

Krista and Eren merely shrugged. "I don't know, but can you please cut back on the swears at work, Ymir?" Krista looked just a bit disappointed in her. "I don't think the employees here really like that." She then looked to Eren. "Right?" Eren just made a noise like 'eh'.

"I've heard worse than that from my old roommates. One time I heard a lot of cussing and one of the beds creaking, so I thought two of them were going at it. Turns out it was just Connie using his CPAP tubing to choke Jean with." 

The awkward memory came flashing back to Eren's mind. He recalled seeing a half-asleep (but very upset) Connie indeed holding his CPAP hose around Jean's neck. Along with that, any swear words Connie was saying were muffled by his mask (which was still on; he'd been napping after a day at work). Eren also recalled Connie beating Jean in the face with one of Reiner's gym shoes.

That last part ended up making Eren laugh in the present day, to Krista and Ymir's concern. 

"What makes it better was that Reiner had some _really_ bad foot odor when that happened." Ymir just looked over at her wife, and back to Eren, and back to her wife again. The whole time, one of her eyebrows was raised.

"You sure you checked this fucker's resume close enough when you hired him?" 

...

"Of all the places we could've gone to for fun, it had to be a place that smelled like cigarettes and fart?" The guys had all barely started putting their names into the scoreboard when Jean started complaining about the bowling alley they were in. "Also these shoes pinch." 

Marco looked over his shoulder and frowned. "You didn't have to come along, Jean. We asked you and you said yes." To this, Jean just scoffed.

"That was before I knew we were going to handle gigantic heavy balls and smell Reiner's nasty feet-" Jean was then cut off by a bowling ball landing directly into his privates. As he collapsed to the floor and held his groin, everyone else looked at Reiner, who'd thrown it. 

"If you're gonna keep trying to pick on me," Reiner said to him as he grabbed another bowling ball to start his turn, "get some new material to work with." He kept going, turning to face the lane while still looking over his shoulder. "My feet smell just fine, thank you." 

Everyone followed suit, waiting for Jean to hurry up and get back to his feet so he could join them. Suffice to say it, his game suffered pretty badly. 

At least there was Connie getting the other guys to laugh at 'ten pound balls' when it wasn't his turn. 


	16. Death by Wal-Mart

"Come on, Reiner! We'll be late for class!"

Armin was having an awfully hard time attempting to pull 209 pounds of pure muscle out of bed. It certainly was much harder than carrying an alligator back out to its sewer. Even so, he persisted, trying to grab Reiner's thick leg and holding it against himself to try and yank him out. 

Naturally, however, Reiner was adamant. He growled and tightly held on to his bed mattress, trying to kick Armin in the stomach in the process. It was awkward to watch, to say the least. Armin managed to hang on tight, though, nearly being flung around like a dog toy.

By now, Reiner had sunk his teeth into his pillow, and attempting to rip it apart.

As if he could hear all the shouting and pleading to stop and get up, Marco walked in and placed a hand on Reiner's head. Like magic, Reiner quit with what he was doing and looked up. He blinked slowly, before letting his leg go back down (very much to Armin's relief). 

"Thanks Marco," Armin said to him as he began cleaning up the scattered feathers and shredded polyester off the floor. 

...

Once Reiner and Armin left for class, Jean was left with sitting next to Bertholdt while watching TV (Bert didn't ever seem to do anything else anymore). Marco and Connie were, of course, making plans for the day. 

"So what do we all need from the store?" Marco asked the others. "I know one of you wrote down some things, but..." He proceeded to hold up a paper with illegible scrawling all over it. "Maybe next time try writing it while you're _not_ half-asleep?" The guys were all about to voice their individual opinions on this, when Jean pointed at the TV. 

"Ain't that the landlord's assistant?" Now everyone's eyes were glued to the screen, wondering what reason Levi ended up on an episode of COPS. 

\---

_"Let me see if I got this right," Officer Brzenska said while she was visible on the screen. "Mister Jinn here has consumed **how much** cocaine in the last 24 hours?"_

_It really said something when the guy dressed as Queen Elsa was the most normal person in this situation. But that was precisely what Levi had on during all of this._

_This was probably the last time he'd hang out with some former tenants; seeing Eld naked and handcuffed, with a bloody nose and screaming his head off, was just an awful thing for him and the others to witness. And yet there he was, on TV for everyone in town to see (and with no censorship at that)._

_None of the other three men really knew what to say. Chances were that they didn't know how coked out he was. Seeing that the three of them were going to be totally silent, Officer Brzenska just pinched the bridge of her nose and shook her head incredulously. She kept doing all that before grabbing hold of Eld and shoving him into the back of the squad car._

_"I can't believe I went to school to end up dealing with this bullshit." It was a bit hard to make out what she was muttering over Eld's loud profanities. She then turned and looked over at the other three. "You can pick him up later at the station, once everything is sorted out with him."_

_She kept talking as the screen transitioned to the title card (which cut to a commercial break): "_ _Oh, and when you do, **please** bring him a pair of pants. He's already pissed himself once it looks like..."_

* * *

The guys all kept staring at the screen, even as the commercials rolled. Not wanting to stay around to see if that segment was going to continue, all of them just stood up out of their seating arrangements and collectively left the apartment. Hopefully none of them would have to see Levi at any point today. 

Without a word, all of them piled into Marco's shitty truck and drove to the grocery store. None of them said anything, even after getting all their impulse purchases and leaving.

They did see the guy who lost his shit on TV on the way out.


End file.
